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1/(I7 


PROPERTY   OF 


PARTMENT  OF  AGRICULTURAL  ECONOMi. 


Using  ttfe  Resources 
of  the  Country  Church 


By 

ERNEST  R.  GROVES 

Professor  of  Sociology 

New  Hampshire  State  College 

^Durham,  N.  H, 


124  East  28th  Street,  New  York 
1917 


coptkight,  1917,  by 

The  International  Committee  of 

Young  Men's  Christian  Associations 


To  THE  MEMORY  OP 

DOROTHY  DOE  GROVES 

*Far  off  thou  art,  but  ever  nigh** 


PREFACE 

The  American  people  are  just  beginning 
to  realize  the  need  of  the  conservation  of 
natural  resources.  There  is  evidence  that 
the  nation  is  slowly  awakening  to  the  ne- 
cessity of  a  wiser  use  of  natural  wealth. 
The  pressure  of  economic  circumstances  is 
emphasizing  for  the  more  thoughtful  the 
importance  of  conservation.  This  idea  of 
a  better  use  of  our  natural  resources  is  of 
the  utmost  social  value.  It  augurs  well 
for  our  future  as  a  nation. 

There  is  equal  need  of  our  taking  heed  of 
our  moral  resources.  Men  and  women  are 
more  important  than  natural  possessions. 
The  greatest  human  wealth  is  morality.  It 
is  this  which  separates  man  from  the  animal 
and  makes  social  life  on  the  human  plane 
possible.  Morality  represents  a  great  so- 
cial resource.  It  needs  conservation,  for 
upon  its  wise  use  depends  human  progress. 

The  country  especially  needs  to  conserve 
its  moral  resources.  Its  social  problems  do 
not  attract  the  attention  that  urban  prob- 


vi  PREFACE 

lems  obtain.  There  is,  therefore,  often  less 
careful  use  of  moral  opportunity.  Moral 
sentiment  is  created,  but  not  directed  into 
social  service.  This  brings  serious  social 
loss. 

This  book  is  a  plea  for  greater  conserva- 
tion of  the  moral  forces  and  opportunities 
to  be  found  in  the  American  small  com- 
munity. It  is  based  upon  the  belief  that 
social  progress  depends  most  upon  moral 
statesmanship,  the  wise  directing  of  the 
moral  energy  which,  fortunately,  is  present 
in  every  community. 

I  wish  to  thank  the  editors  of  Rural 
Manhood  for  permission  to  make  use  of 
material  contributed  to  that  periodical. 

June,  1917.  E.  R.  G. 


CONTENTS 

Page 

Preface v 

Introduction 1 

I.    The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  City  Drift 5 

II.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  its  Moral  Advan- 
tages      23 

III.  The  Minister    of    the    Small 

Community  and  the  Conser- 
vation OF  His  Social  Experi- 
ences       33 

IV.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 

munity and  the  Conservation 
OF  Community  Spirit 46 

V.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  the  Conservation 
OF  THE  Family 55 

VI.    The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  THE  Conservation 
.  OF  Recreation 66 

VII.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity and  the  Conservation 
OF  Physical  Health 75 

VIII.    The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  THE  Conservation 

of  Mental  Health 86 

vii 


viii  CONTENTS 

Page 

IX.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  THE  Problem  of 
THE  Feeble-minded 96 

X.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  THE  Conservation 
of  Beauty 109 

XI.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  THE  Conservation 
OF  Goodness 116 

XII.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  the  Conservation 
OF  Truth 124 

XIII.  The  Church  of  the  Small  Com- 
munity AND  THE  Conservation 
OF  Human  Experiences 134 

XrV.  The  Minister  of  the  Church 
OF  THE  Small  Community  and 
His  Personal  Opportunities  .   142 


INTRODUCTION 

The  great  social  need  of  our  time  is  the 
bringing  of  the  rehgion  of  Jesus  closer  to 
the  deep,  concrete  needs  of  men  and 
women.  This  has  always  been  the  great 
social  need,  for  men  and  women  cannot 
live  well  together  unless  they  root  their 
lives  in  profound  spiritual  vitality.  Sin  is 
a  human  evil — not  the  fault  of  a  period  of 
time.  Social  ills  are  sins  expressed  in  or- 
ganized forms — personal  selfishness  show- 
ing its  relationships  in  its  social  conse- 
quences. Neither  the  bad  man  nor  the 
good  man  can  live  unto  himself. 

It  is  therefore  the  business  of  Chris- 
tianity both  to  develop  spiritual  power  and 
to  put  it  to  use.  Full  service  is  impossible 
if  the  Christian  organization  fails  in  either 
of  these  activities.  Socially  men  must  be 
made  to  feel  as  brothers  and  then  they 
must  be  taught  to  act  as  such.  There  is 
no  easier  way  socially  than  this  path  of 


2  INTRODUCTION 

brotherhood  and  unselfish  service.  With- 
out the  service  the  brotherhood  soon  ceases 
to  seem  real.  Without  the  brotherhood  the 
service  soon  loses  its  courage  and  high 
ideals.  Without  spiritual  vitality  both 
brotherhood  and  service  fail  to  withstand 
the  test  of  time. 

This  generation  appears,  however,  to 
have  a  social  distinction,  even  if  the  great 
social  problems  are  merely  the  expressions 
of  human  selfishness.  It  is  more  difiicult 
than  in  earlier  times  to  see  the  personal 
evil  in  the  social  ill.  The  sin  of  the  indi- 
vidual is  lost  in  the  great  complexity  of  the 
situation.  It  is  difficult  to  fix  responsi- 
bility. Often  we  are  uncertain  as  to  what 
expresses  bad  judgment  and  what  shows 
wicked  intent. 

The  size,  organization,  and  intricacy  of 
our  social  problems  "put  upon  us  a  greater 
moral  test.  We  must  be  better  than  our 
fathers  or  our  social  life  will  be  less  Chris- 
tian than  theirs.  Human  progress  re- 
quires, if  we  are  to  live  a  satisfactory  social 
life,  a  superior  morality.     This  it  is  the 


INTRODUCTION  8 

task  of  the  Christian  organizations  to  de- 
velop. 

It  is  the  temptation  of  some  well-feeHng 
people  to  think  of  service  as  something 
done  at  a  distance.  The  great  social  con- 
tributions must  always  come,  however, 
from  those  who  see  needs  close  at  hand 
and  have  the  good  judgment  and  the  true 
courage  to  meet  such  needs.  Whether 
Christianity  keeps  close  to  human  neces- 
sities or  not  depends  upon  the  interpreta- 
tion it  receives;  therefore.  Christian  teach- 
ers are  under  obligation  to  keep  always  in 
mind  the  great  necessity  of  making  spirit- 
ual opportunity  appear  closely  related  to 
the  social  service  of  the  individual.  We 
must  not  be  selfish  even  in  our  spiritual 
experiences.  Spiritual  vitality  depends 
upon  the  social  impulse. 

No  organization  needs  to  cultivate  the 
habit  of  seeing  possible  service  near  at  hand 
more  than  does  the  country  church.  The 
relation  between  it  and  the  community  in 
which  it  lives  is  so  definite  that  it  can  never 
have  excuse  for  failing  to  realize  its  com- 


4  INTRODUCTION 

munity  responsibilities.  It  is  of  the  com- 
munity, in  spite  of  itself,  and  its  spiritual 
possibilities  are  found  in  its  happy  dis- 
covery of  the  largeness  of  its  community 
ministration. 

No  service  for  the  community  can  be 
greater  than  to  conserve  its  moral  forces 
by  revealing  and  directing  human  ideal- 
ism. This  is  the  high  calling  of  the  com- 
munity church.  It  puts  to  work  the  as- 
pirations of  the  community  and  stimulates 
every  good  endeavor.  It  becomes  spiritual 
in  social  service. 

Rural  progress  depends  most  of  all  upon 
the  conservation  by  the  country  church  of 
its  moral  and  spiritual  resources.  Men  and 
women  in  village  and  rural  life  must  first 
come  under  the  influence  of  a  practical 
idealism  before  other  efforts  to  solve  press- 
ing social  problems  in  the  country  and 
small  towns  can  hope  to  have  success.  The 
church  therefore  that  has  found  its  social 
mission  in  a  wise  passion  for  concrete  com- 
munity service,  has  become  to  its  place  of 
ministration  indeed  the  Church  of  God. 


I 

THE   CHURCH   OF  THE   SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  CITY  DRIFT 

The  church  of  the  small  community  is 
vitally  interested  in  the  problem  of  city 
drift.  It  is  not  to  be  expected  that  all  of 
the  youth  of  a  small  country  place  or 
village  will  remain  at  home.  Many  of 
the  young  men  and  women  ought  to  go  to 
the  cities,  for  only  in  urban  environment 
can  they  expect  to  find  their  deepest  de- 
sires satisfied.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is 
often  true  that  the  city  draws  from  the 
community  individuals  who  could  live  a 
happier  and  healthier  life  in  the  country, 
were  they  well  prepared  to  make  the  most 
of  their  rural  opportunities.  This  move- 
ment of  population  from  the  small  com- 
munity to  the  city  concerns  the  rural  and 
village  church  profoundly.  It  often  robs 
the  church  of  its  most  promising  leaders. 
It   presents   a   problem   that   the  church 


6        COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

needs  to  study  if  it  attempts  to  conserve 
the  human  resources  of  the  small  com- 
munity. 

Modern  psychology  proves  the  useless- 
ness  of  attempting  to  understand  adult 
conduct  by  mere  study  of  adult  motives 
and  circumstances,  for  the  adult  brings  to 
each  decision  an  accumulation  of  past  ex- 
periences largely  determining  his  choices, 
and  in  this  personal  collection  the  happen- 
ings of  childhood  and  early  youth  have  the 
greatest  significance.  It  is  by  no  means 
necessary  that  the  adult,  as  he  faces  a 
definite  situation,  and  is  influenced  in  his 
decision  by  motives  born  of  childhood  en- 
vironment, should  recognize  the  fact  that 
he  acts  as  he  does  because  of  the  events 
of  his  early  life. 

In  many  cases  there  is  no  clear  under- 
standing of  the  significance  of  early  im- 
pressions, but  this  fact  in  no  sense  lessens 
the  importance  of  the  true  cause  of  the 
conduct.  It  is  reasonable  to  assume  that 
any  social  movement  which  has  become 
pronounced   enough   to  be  clearly  recog- 


CITY  DRIFT  7 

nized  as  characteristic  of  a  period  of  time 
and  group  of  people,  has  behind  it,  acting 
as  a  source  of  motives,  a  collection  of 
similar  significant  early  impressions. 

The  movement  of  population  toward 
urban  centers,  so  strongly  expressed  in 
Europe  and  America  at  the  present  time, 
deserves  study  in  the  light  of  the  modern 
teaching  of  psychology  concerning  the 
meaning  of  childhood  experiences  as  de- 
termining adult  conduct.  It  is  everywhere 
admitted  that  this  urban  attraction  of  rural 
population  is  socially  significant,  and  that 
its  causes  are  many.  It  is  even  feared  by 
many  that  it  represents  an  unwholesome 
and  dangerous  tendency  in  modern  life,  and 
that  it  should  be  investigated  for  the  pur- 
pose of  discovering  a  reasonable  check 
upon  this  drift  to  the  cities. 

No  study  of  the  mental  causes  behind 
this  urban  enticement  can  fail  to  discover 
the  importance  of  the  suggestions  received 
by  country  children  during  their  prepara- 
tion for  life.  Suggestions  influence  the 
child  profoundly,  and,  of  course,  not  less 


8         COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

in  the  country  than  in  the  city.  In  many 
cases  the  Hfe  of  the  rural  child  is  pene- 
trated more  deeply  by  significant  sugges- 
tions, because  his  life,  since  it  is  spent  in  a 
less  complex  environment,  offers  a  smaller 
quantity  of  suggestions,  or  a  greater  uni- 
formity of  such  influence.  In  any  case,  the 
suggestions  that  enter  the  mind  of  the  rural 
child  provide  a  basis  for  explaining  later 
actions. 

Some  of  the  deepest  impressions  in  any 
child's  life  are  the  results  of  parents'  atti- 
tudes. The  child  can  hardly  fail  to  be 
moved  by  the  feeling  and  opinion  of  his 
father  and  mother,  and  usually  their  feel- 
ings and  opinions  are  repeatedly  expressed. 
Especially  with  reference  to  their  occupa- 
tion and  environment,  rural  parents  are 
likely  to  have  attitudes  that  are  frankly 
and  often  expressed.  Many  a  child  brought 
up  in  the  country  is  given  again  and  again, 
even  perhaps  several  times  a  day  during 
the  most  impressionable  years,  suggestions 
born  of  rural  discontent. 

Every  occupation  provides  reasons  for 


CITY  DRIFT  9 

discontent,  but  in  the  country  any  dissatis- 
faction with  the  conditions  of  the  chief 
industry,  farming,  is  Hkely  to  develop  into 
discontent  regarding  the  country  itself,  for 
the  occupation  and  the  environment  are 
hardly  to  be  distinguished.  Indeed,  in 
leaving  the  occupation  of  farming,  it  is 
usually  necessary  for  such  people  also  to 
leave  the  country  towns.  Not  infrequently 
the  parent  expresses  discontent  regarding 
the  conditions  of  life  in  the  country,  when 
the  reason  for  his  attitude  is  only  one  un- 
happy, perhaps  temporary,  condition  in  his 
occupation.  Discontent  seldom  discrimi- 
nates, and  there  is  much  to  tempt  the  dis- 
satisfied farmer  to  express  his  emotions  in 
a  general  indictment  against  rural  life. 

It  requires  no  argument  to  demonstrate 
that  the  child  interprets  his  suggestions  with 
a  minimum  of  discrimination.  Although 
negative  suggestion  at  times  operates,  and 
the  child  takes  the  attitude  opposite  that 
of  the  parent,  as  a  rule  he  assumes  things 
to  be  as  they  are  said  to  be.  If  the  child, 
even  after  a  number  of  years,  feels  the  dis- 


10       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

content  of  father  or  mother,  or  both,  with 
reference  to  Kving  in  the  country  and  re- 
specting rural  environment,  it  is  to  be  ex- 
pected that  he  will  accumulate  a  mass  of 
mental  material  which  sooner  or  later  is 
bound  to  provide  motives  for  conduct. 

In  this  connection,  one  needs  to  remem- 
ber that  all  who  live  in  the  country  are  not 
there  because  they  prefer  the  country  to  the 
town.  They  may  have  failed  to  find  an  op- 
portunity to  go  to  the  city,  or  they  may 
have  lacked  the  courage  to  attempt  a 
radically  different  life  and  occupation.  In 
some  cases  urban-minded  people  do  not 
have  their  urban  cravings  awakened  until 
they  have  become  so  fixed  in  the  country 
that  economic  heroism  is  required  to  pull 
up  stakes  and  move  to  the  city;  and  it  so 
happens  that  one  may  be  in  the  country 
but  not  of  it,  spreading  discontent  regard- 
ing rural  conditions  at  every  opportunity. 
Certainly  such  discontent  cannot  fail  to 
suggest  dissatisfaction  to  rural  youth. 

Rural  education,  of  course,  provides 
many  opportunities  for  penetrating  sug- 


CITY  DRIFT  11 

gestions,  and  any  one  who  intimately 
knows  the  schools  of  the  country  will  ad- 
mit that  their  suggestions  are  not  always 
friendly  to  rural  interests.  The  character 
of  some  studies  makes  it  difficult  for  the 
teacher  not  to  emphasize  urban  conditions. 
In  the  endeavor  after  the  dramatic  and  the 
ideal,  the  teacher  is  likely  to  draw  upon 
urban  life,  since  urban  life  circumstances 
provide  so  much  that  surely  will  appeal  to 
the  country  boy  and  girl. 

It  is  fair  to  state  that  a  beginning  has 
been  made  in  the  effort  to  utilize  country 
life  possibilities  in  teaching  material.  But 
one  usually  finds  in  the  ordinary  text-book 
an  unconscious  tendency  to  emphasize  the 
urban  point  of  view  and  to  accept  it  as  the 
social  standard.  Many  of  the  striking 
human  experiences  of  modern  life  neces- 
sarily culminate  amid  urban  conditions, 
even  when  caused  largely  by  rural  in- 
fluences. The  urban  center  is  the  passion 
spot,  and  affords  more  opportunity  for  the 
exploration  of  the  dramatic. 

The  same  fact  is  true  of  ideals.     The 


12       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

teacher  is  often  tempted  to  use  urban  illus- 
trations in  her  effort  to  establish  ideals  of 
conduct.  The  spectacular  character  of  moral 
struggle  and  ethical  effort  in  the  city  makes 
urban  life  a  source  from  which  to  draw  in- 
teresting moral  appeal.  This  bias  in  teach- 
ing is  magnified  not  infrequently  by  the  at- 
titude of  the  teacher  toward  rural  life, 
consciously  or  unconsciously.  She — for  of 
course  the  rural  teacher  is  usually  a  woman 
— has  often  a  mind  filled  with  urban  inter- 
ests and  a  craving  born  of  urban  purposes, 
and  she  displays  enthusiasm  in  sympathy 
with  her  deepest  wishes.  She  may  in  this 
manner  become  an  ambassador  who  rep- 
resents the  condition  of  her  choice — urban 
life.  When  she  is  a  teacher  of  skill,  ambi- 
tion, and  progress,  it  is  hardly  strange  that 
she  expects  to  move  on  to  a  larger  town, 
and  finally,  if  fortunate,  to  a  city;  for  upon 
such  a  career  depends  largely  her  progress 
in  her  profession — her  increase  in  salary, 
her  freedom,  and  her  professional  standing. 
The  suggestion  of  the  urban-minded 
teacher  and  the  urban-inspired  school  sys- 


CITY  DRIFT  13 

tern  are  bound  to  provide  effective  sug- 
gestions that  will  later  provide  a  basis  for 
rural  discontent. 

It  is  because  of  such  subtle  suggestions 
that  the  child  often  first  decides  to  try 
city  life;  and,  even  when  the  decisions  are 
soon  forgotten,  a  sort  of  passing  childish 
whim,  they  leave  a  remnant  of  possible 
discontent  which  later  in  life  may  become 
an  element  in  a  complex  sentiment  of  dis- 
satisfaction. To  value  this  rightly,  one 
must  remember  how  open  the  child  is  to 
suggestions,  and  how  certain  such  in- 
fluences are  to  last,  and  how  constantly 
they  may  be  received  term  after  term  from 
the  teacher. 

Rural  youth  obtain  suggestions  of  enor- 
mous effect  from  the  circumstances  of 
their  own  personal  careers.  When  the 
young  man  or  woman  has  exhausted  an 
economic  environment  that  seems  meager 
and  monotonous  because  he  or  she  is  badly 
prepared  by  inefficient  education  to  inter- 
pret it,  there  is  but  one  thing  that  can  be 
done  in  order  to  obtain  relief:  that  is  to 


14       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

move  away.  In  the  city,  a  like  failure  may 
mean  a  change  of  occupation.  To  change 
one's  occupation  in  the  country  requires 
usually  that  one  leave  the  country.  Sug- 
gestions therefore  that  farming  does  not 
pay,  or  is  too  laborious  and  unprofitable, 
translated  into  effective  action,  bring  about 
a  removal  from  both  industry  and  locality. 
The  early  experiences  on  the  farm  may 
leave  a  suggestion  of  unreasonable  toil. 
Romantic  youth  cannot  rest  content  with 
a  vision  of  endless,  lengthened  hours  of 
work  and  merely  a  living.  Other  oppor- 
tunities provide  a  living  also,  and  less  toil. 
Parents  have  at  times  been  responsible  for 
this  conception  of  farming,  because  they 
have  insisted  upon  having  their  sons  and 
daughters  work  unreasonably  during  vaca- 
tion and  after  school.  The  parent  who 
looks  backward  upon  a  generation  more 
given  to  long  toil  than  this,  and  uses  his 
own  earlier  experiences  as  a  standard,  may 
the  more  easily  commit  this  mistake  and 
teach  his  children  to  hate  the  farm  and 
rural  life. 


CITY  DRIFT  15 

The  adult  of  little  imagination  is  likely 
to  forget  another  source  of  experiences  in 
youth  that  may  suggest  to  the  country  boy 
attitudes  that  later  provide  a  basis  for  dis- 
content in  regard  to  rural  life.  The  boy 
on  the  farm  finds  at  times  that  his  holiday 
and  vacation  are  encroached  upon  by 
needed  labor.  Weather  and  harvest  condi- 
tions rob  him  of  the  pleasures  that  his  vil- 
lage chum  enjoys.  Some  definite  plan  for 
an  outing,  or  some  greatly  desired  day  of 
sport  has  to  be  given  up  that  the  crop 
may  not  be  injured. 

Doubtless  parents  allow  these  disap= 
pointments  to  happen  with  little  reason, 
and  looking  at  the  matter  from  an  adult 
point  of  view,  do  not  regard  the  boys'  feel- 
ings as  of  serious  significance;  and  yet,  in 
the  light  of  modern  psychology,  we  know 
that  such  experiences  may  build  up  a  very 
significant  hostility  to  the  rural  environ- 
ment that  appears  to  be  the  cause  of  these 
agonizing  disappointments.  The  cumula- 
tive effect  of  a  few  bitter  experiences  of 
this  nature  may  be  sufficient  to  turn  the 


16       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

boy  away  from  the  country  in  his  heart 
of  hearts  for  all  time.  In  such  cases  the 
first  opportunity  to  leave  the  country  for 
the  town  will  be  accepted  gladly,  as  a  way 
of  escape  from  a  life  that  is  emotionally 
intolerable. 

A  visit  to  some  communities  is  enough 
to  explain  the  migration  from  these  com- 
munities, for  they  disclose  themselves  as 
having  lost  their  self-respect.  You  will 
hear  it  said  in  such  places  repeatedly  that 
no  young  man  of  worth  is  to  be  expected  to 
remain  in  the  town.  It  is  no  place  for  one 
who  wishes  to  make  something  of  himself. 
There  is  no  opportunity,  because  the  town 
is  dead.  The  social  atmosphere  is  com- 
posed of  community  discouragement,  fault- 
finding, and  suspicion.  There  is  no  hope 
among  the  people,  no  spirit  of  progress.  A 
depression  which  may  sink  even  to  despair 
drives  the  normal  youth  out  of  the  town, 
with  the  idea  that  all  farming  communities 
are  decadent  and  not  to  be  endured. 

This  prevailing  lack  of  community  spirit 
and  social  courage  must,  in  certain  farm- 


CITY  DRIFT  17 

ing  communities,  act  as  a  most  persistent 
and  powerful  stimulus  to  constant  migra- 
tions. The  great  need  in  such  rural  com- 
munities is  the  development  of  community 
confidence  and  self-respect,  and  any  suc- 
cess in  bringing  in  a  happier  social  attitude 
lessens  the  movement  of  the  population  to 
the  city. 

The  discouraged  and  discontented  rural 
community  lacks  most  of  all  wise,  public- 
spirited  leaders,  for  naturally  its  powerful 
persons  have  mostly  moved  away.  There 
is  little  that  works  for  the  upbuilding  of 
the  community,  for  in  the  nature  of  things, 
influences  that  move  public  opinion  and 
color  social  feeling  require  strong  personali- 
ties for  their  source,  and  it  is  just  such 
persons  that  have  been  driven  away  in 
despair. 

People  from  outside  the  community  are 
greatly  handicapped  in  any  help  that  they 
may  try  to  give,  for  the  natives  are  both 
sensitive  and  suspicious  and  easily  given  to 
jealousy.  Such  outside  assistance,  given 
with  the  best  of  purposes,  is  no  doubt  often 


18       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

trivial,  tactless,  and  even  foolish.  He  who 
attempts  "rural  uplift"  with  missionary 
motives  and  attitudes  soon  finds  his  task 
hopeless,  as  a  result  of  the  deep  resentment 
felt  by  those  whom  he  attempts  to  serve. 

Nevertheless,  in  its  last  analysis,  the 
problem  of  rural  progress  in  a  disheartened 
community  must  be  solved  mostly  by  con- 
serving what  leadership  still  remains,  and 
by  means  of  intelligent  counsel  and  in- 
spiration given  by  social  and  rural  workers 
from  outside  the  community  who  may  be- 
come interested  in  it.  So  long  as  there  is 
little  constructive  leadership  at  that  point, 
the  social  condition  encourages  city  drift. 

The  student  of  rural  life  is  tempted  to 
look  too  much  to  the  country  and  too  little 
to  the  city  for  the  causes  of  rural  migra- 
tion. It  is  not  easy  to  value  properly  the 
constant  and  impressive  suggestions  of 
urban  opportunity  furnished  by  the  city. 
It  is  important  to  recognize  that  the  pros- 
perity of  the  city  requires  that  it  exploit 
itself  in  ways  that  bring  people  to  the  city 
to  live  as  well  as  to  trade.    Better  business 


CITY  DRIFT  19 

is  obtained  by  methods  of  advertising  that 
naturally  lead  to  more  people. 

Modern  advertising  is  itself  a  supreme 
illustration  of  effective  suggestion,  and  its 
development  has  been  for  the  most  part 
in  the  hands  of  urban  interests.  Such  ad- 
vertising has  forced  rural  people  to  con- 
trast their  manner  of  life  with  urban  con- 
ditions, often  with  the  result  of  discontent. 
They  are  drawn  to  the  city  on  special  occa- 
sions by  alluring  city  publicity  manipu- 
lated with  scientific  skill  by  experts,  and 
often  return  to  their  country  homes  dis- 
satisfied because  of  false  notions  regarding 
the  pleasures  of  the  city.  Of  course  this 
is  more  largely  true  of  young  people  and 
they  are  more  open  to  suggestion. 

Recently  a  carnival,  skilfully  advertised 
and  staged,  was  held  in  a  western  city.  The 
most  popular  young  woman  in  each  of  the 
neighboring  small  communities,  elected  by 
ballot,  was  invited  to  attend  the  gathering 
for  several  days  as  the  guest  of  the  carnival 
association.  Listening  to  one  of  these 
young  women  telling  her  experiences  in 


20       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

this,  the  most  exciting  week  of  her  Hfe,  one 
wondered  whether  she  could  ever  again 
feel  content  with  the  more  normal  joys  of 
country  life.  Such  an  experience  is  merely 
one  illustration  of  the  countless  forms  that 
urban  suggestion  takes  as  it  penetrates  into 
the  lives  of  rural  people. 

Spectacular  success  is  largely  dependent 
upon  urban  conditions  of  life,  and  such 
success  obtains  public  attention.  Even  in 
the  country,  the  successes  talked  about  are 
likely  to  be  those  made  possible  by  city 
life.  These  are  given  space  in  the  maga- 
zines and  daily  papers  edited  and  pub- 
lished in  the  cities,  and  so  they  naturally 
occupy  the  minds  of  rural  readers  of  such 
periodicals. 

The  young  man  who  feels  the  attraction 
of  such  enterprise,  who  wishes  to  have  a 
part  in  big  things,  even  if  an  insignificant 
part,  who  craves  knowing  big  business  at 
first  hand,  receives  a  suggestion  that  invites 
him  cityward.  When  a  community  is  it- 
self represented  by  some  former  resident  in 
some  spectacular  success,  it  is  certain  that 


CITY  DRIFT  21 

many  young  men  will  question  their  future 
on  the  farm  in  that  locality.  Thus  the 
human  product  of  a  rural  community  robs 
it  of  its  personality  resources,  and  the  ca- 
reer of  the  man  of  fame  may  continue  to 
act  as  a  tradition  long  after  his  death,  and 
still  add  to  the  rural  migration. 

It  is  not  altogether  clear  what  effect 
visitors  in  the  summer  from  cities  have 
upon  rural  people  with  reference  to  city 
drift.  Although  a  matter  of  accident, 
perhaps,  depending  upon  the  character  of 
the  city  people,  and  important  only  in  a 
limited  area  of  the  country,  summer  vis- 
itors, nevertheless,  must  provide  sugges- 
tions that  occasionally  operate  powerfully 
upon  some  young  people  in  the  country 
in  encouraging  their  going  to  the  cities. 

Certain  facts  in  some  of  our  New  Eng- 
land country  towns,  where  visitors  from  the 
city  return  summer  after  summer,  appear  to 
indicate  that  this  condition  does  encourage 
young  people  in  going  to  the  city.  Such  a 
result  might  be  expected  in  the  light  of 
motives  that  govern  human  conduct  and 


22       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

the  influence  that  luxury  and  leisure  have 
in  bringing  about  discontent  in  the  minds 
of  workers  who  look  with  envy  upon  the 
pleasures  of  others. 

Perhaps  this  suggestion  may  be  ex- 
pected to  operate  more  upon  the  girl  than 
upon  the  boy,  for  the  girl  sees  in  the 
woman  visitor  from  the  city  a  candidate 
for  matrimony  who  has  advantages  over 
her  rural  rival.  It  is  not  difficult  to  trace 
the  influence  of  summer  people  upon  the 
fashion  of  the  women  of  the  small  country 
community,  and  we  have  every  right  to 
assume  that  deeper  suggestions  are  stim- 
ulated than  those  that  have  to  do  with 
manners  or  dress. 


n 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COiVUMUNITY  AND  ITS  MORAL 
ADVANTAGES 

It  is  encouraging  to  the  social  worker  in 
the  country  to  consider  the  moral  re- 
sources provided  by  the  rural  environment. 
The  minister  of  the  small  -  community 
church  does  well  to  estimate  the  advan- 
tages that  his  field  of  service  has  over  city 
life.  Of  course  rural  and  urban  society 
each  has  its  moral  superiorities.  Each  also 
has  its  peculiar  disadvantages.  The  coun- 
try worker  often  appears  to  make  the  mis- 
take of  not  appreciating  fully  the  advan- 
tages that  are  naturally  furnished  by  the 
country  environment. 

Not  to  recognize  clearly  the  resources 
provided  for  one's  service  is  a  fatal  mis- 
take. Success  depends  upon  conditions. 
Moral  service  requires  the  utilization  of 
the  resources  that  make  it  possible.     The 

23 


24       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

more  definite  and  discriminating  the  con- 
ception of  moral  resources  on  the  part  of 
the  social  worker,  the  more  fortunate  it 
becomes  for  those  to  whom  he  ministers. 

It  is  necessary  also  that  the  worker  in 
the  country  have  a  very  precise  idea  of  the 
end  he  wishes  to  accomplish.  Although  the 
object  is  bound  to  be  individual  and  to 
vary  in  its  concrete  form  with  the  person 
for  whom  one  works,  it  is,  nevertheless, 
possible  to  state  it  in  general  terms.  Moral 
service  attempts  to  use  the  opportunities 
provided  by  each  person's  instincts  and 
desires,  that  a  wholesome  moral  career 
may  result.  This  effort  to  moralize  the 
life  requires  that  the  personal  and  social 
resources  be  both  known  and  used. 

It  is  folly  for  any  worker  to  regard  any 
serious  social  problem  as  having  little  to 
do  with  morals.  At  the  heart  of  every 
social  difficulty  is  its  moral  cause.  It  is 
equally  true  that  a  disregard  of  the  moral 
resources  that  may  be  employed  to  solve 
the  problem  is  most  unfortunate. 

A  very  great  resource  in  the  small  com- 


MORAL  ADVANTAGES  25 

munity  is  the  rather  general  neighborhood 
interest.  In  most  places  this  is  expressed 
in  feelings  that  may  be  rightly  defined  as 
neighborhood  spirit.  It  is  common  knowl- 
edge that  interest  is  the  root  of  sympathy. 
One  does  not  care  for  those  in  whom  he  has 
no  interest — at  least  not  without  great 
moral  labor.  The  conditions  of  city  life 
make  this  interest  in  persons  difficult;  the 
circumstances  of  rural  and  village  life  make 
it  normal  and  inevitable  that  the  members 
of  the  group  should  be  interested  in  one 
another.  It  is  indeed  true  that  this  inter- 
est does  not  always  express  itself  in  happy 
ways.  It  is  at  times  the  source  of  antago- 
nisms and  jealousies.  It  remains  a  fact, 
however,  that  people  in  the  small  com- 
munity find  it  easy  to  become  interested  in 
one  another  and  that  people  in  the  large 
city  find  it  difficult  to  be  much  interested 
in  many  persons. 

The  relation  between  urban  people  is 
likely  to  be  economic.  Outside  a  very 
small  group  of  friends,  the  relations  have 
mostly  to   do   with   commercial  interests 


26       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

among  the  different  members  of  the  group. 
These  interests  appear  for  the  most  part 
to  be  of  a  character  that  forbids  real  sym- 
pathy, for  they  seem  largely  antagonistic. 
The  reverse  is  true  in  the  small  community. 
The  economic  relations  are  generally  few; 
the  personal  basis  of  association  is  the  pre- 
dominating one.  People  take  a  natural 
and  human  interest  in  one  another. 

This  interest  makes  possible  a  very  real 
and  delightful  fellow-feeling.  Under  whole- 
some moral  influence  this  resource  of  per- 
sonal interest  becomes  the  root  of  a  very 
practical  and  beautiful  sympathy.  The 
church  of  the  small  community  has  no 
larger  or  more  promising  asset.  It  can 
turn  this  sympathy  into  many  of  the  most 
attractive  human  virtues. 

It  is  doubtful  whether  this  resource  of 
sympathy  is  generally  regarded  at  its  true 
value,  whether  the  churches  know  how  to 
get  from  it  all  its  moral  wealth.  Often  a 
clear  appreciation  of  its  importance  as  a 
moral  element  in  social  life  is  lacking. 
Greater  effort  may  be  made  to  create  sym- 


MORAL  ADVANTAGES  27 

pathy  for  distant  and  different  people  than 
to  use  the  normal  and  promising  sympathy 
already  available.  Of  course  the  creation 
of  the  first  in  no  way  limits  the  second, 
but  it  is  sad  to  see  a  great  moral  oppor- 
tunity neglected,  even  if  moral  effort  is 
bringing  success  at  another  point.  Prob- 
ably in  all  such  cases  the  mistake  is  made 
in  not  clearly  appreciating  how  much  good 
may  be  made  to  come  from  the  fact  that  in 
a  small  community  people  are  naturally 
interested  in  one  another. 

The  conditions  of  life  in  the  small  com- 
munity offer  also  another  advantage.  It 
is  easy  to  establish  a  basis  for  personal 
moral  responsibility.  Concerning  the  im- 
portance of  this  for  the  moral  worker  there 
can  be  no  doubt.  The  fixing  of  personal  re- 
sponsibility is  the  largest  problem  in  moral 
progress.  A  community  life  that  naturally 
puts  upon  each  person  the  obligations  that 
rightly  belong  to  him,  and  that  holds  him 
responsible  for  his  actions,  provides  the 
moral  worker  with  very  great  resources. 

Conditions  are  different  in  the  city.  The 


28       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

size  and  complexity  of  the  city,  the  different 
classes  and  different  standards  of  moral  life, 
the  lack  of  knowledge  of  the  habits  of  one's 
neighbors,  the  indifference  of  one  person 
concerning  the  activities  of  another — all  of 
these  conditions  make  it  difficult,  even  im- 
possible for  the  most  part,  to  fix  personal 
responsibility. 

It  is  true  that  in  the  cities  there  are  well- 
organized  and  efficient  societies  that  have 
for  their  purpose  the  discovery  of  evil  con- 
ditions and  the  apprehension  of  the  persons 
responsible.  The  creation  of  these  gives 
proof  that  urban  life  is  weak  in  its  ability 
to  fix  responsibility.  The  society  attempts 
to  do  what  the  normal  and  wholesome  pub- 
lic opinion  in  the  small  community  nat- 
urally does. 

Great  efforts  are  made  in^^the  city  to 
create  a  public  opinion  that  will  be  con- 
cerned with  evils  and  that  will  express 
disapproval.  These  endeavors  of  the  pub- 
lic to  find  the  evildoer  and  punish  him 
socially  are  likely  to  be  fitful,  often  unfair, 
and  usually,  because  of  their  spasmodic 


MORAL  ADVANTAGES  29 

character,  ineffective.  Their  partial  suc- 
cesses cost  much  time,  money,  and  thought 
which  has  to  be  contributed  by  a  few  pub- 
lic-spirited leaders  in  social  reforms. 

There  is  often  honest  doubt  as  to  the  real 
beginning  of  an  evil  situation.  When  the 
origin  has  been  found  the  question  who  is 
to  blame  is  still  difficult  to  answer.  It  often 
seems  unfair  to  put  the  responsibility  upon 
any  one  person — so  many  have  contributed 
to  the  evil  circumstance.  Indeed,  the 
public  itself,  in  a  most  general  and  irre- 
sponsible sense,  may  have  been  mostly  to 
blame  for  the  evil  for  which  it  now  wishes 
to  punish  some  one. 

In  the  country  and  village  environment 
there  is  usually  a  very  definite  and  forceful 
fixing  of  responsibility.  This  may  at  times 
lack  sympathy  and  perspective.  It  may 
even  become  cruel.  It  is,  however,  a  very 
powerful  resource  for  the  moral  worker. 

It  becomes  the  duty  of  the  church  of  the 
small  community  to  take  advantage  of  this 
fixing  of  responsibility  and  to  make  it  con- 
structive.   It  requires  education  and  direc- 


30       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

tion.  It  needs  to  be  given  attention  in  a 
sympathetic  way.  Young  people  especially 
need  to  realize  the  importance  of  public 
opinion  and  the  reason  why  it  is  unwise 
and  socially  wrong  to  become  indifferent 
to  what  people  may  say. 

Probably  no  one  would  deny  that  this 
fear  of  public  criticism  does  not  furnish 
the  highest  type  of  morality.  The  history 
of  early  morality,  especially  in  primitive 
life,  shows,  nevertheless,  that  it  is  often 
the  beginning  of  a  moral  regard  which 
finally  develops  into  a  higher  moral  stand- 
ard. It  may  wisely  be  used  to  teach  men 
and  women  to  value  morality  for  its  own 
sake. 

Since  men  and  women  in  small  com- 
munities are  certain  to  make  moral  judg- 
ments regarding  the  doings  of  their  fellows, 
it  becomes  the  clear  duty  of  the  church  to 
establish  the  proper  standard  for  moral 
criticism.  Its  effective  service  depends 
largely  upon  its  ability  to  make  the  people 
of  the  community  realize  what  the  things 
are  that  are  blameworthy  and  under  what 


MORAL  ADVANTAGES  SI 

conditions  the  persons  responsible  should  be 
blamed.  The  significance  of  the  attitude 
of  the  community  itself  may  wisely  be  em- 
phasized, and  a  wholesome  sympathy  cre- 
ated for  the  person  who  morally  fails. 

All  students  of  country  life  point  out 
that  it  has  one  large  advantage  over  city 
life.  The  small  community,  especially 
when  rural  in  character,  makes  it  easy  for 
the  developing  youth  to  obtain  direct  ex- 
perience with  nature.  In  the  city  the 
greater  amount  of  experience  is  with  per- 
sons. Persons  may  be  tricked.  Persons 
may  be  manipulated.  Quick  results,  at 
least  for  a  time,  may  be  obtained  by  sug- 
gestions. It  becomes  easy,  therefore,  for 
the  city-dweller  to  discount  reality,  to  for- 
get the  fact  that  all  of  life  is  governed  by 
law.  In  the  country  the  direct  and  per- 
sonal contact  with  nature  teaches  one  that 
substantial  results  can  be  had  only  by 
knowledge  of  methods  and  honest  effort. 
Nature  cannot  be  deceived  and  is  not  in- 
fluenced by  words  or  methods  of  sug- 
gestion. 


32       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

This  appreciation  of  the  lawful  character 
of  all  life,  this  knowledge  that  what  a  man 
sows  that  must  he  reap,  has  a  very  large 
value  in  moral  training.  It  is  a  hard  lesson 
and  man  tries  not  to  learn  it.  In  the  city 
he  may  deceive  himself  into  believing  it  is 
not  always  true.  In  the  country,  however, 
at  every  point  the  truth  is  forced  upon  him. 

This  moral  resource  also  the  church  needs 
to  use  to  the  uttermost.  There  is  no  deeper 
moral  truth.  It  is  surely  an  advantage  to 
the  moral  teacher  to  have  an  environment 
that  enforces  such  an  important  truth  at 
every  point.  The  church  can  make  con- 
stant use  of  this  common  experience  to 
make  life  serious  and  worthy.  In  this 
direct  contact  with  a  nature  which  is  law- 
ful, the  church  has  in  the  small  community 
a  moral  assistance  of  the  greatest  value. 


Ill 

THE  MINISTER  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OF  HIS  SOCIAL  EX- 
PERIENCES 

•  In  writing  of  the  work  of  a  bishop,  John 
Ruskin  once  said:  his  first  duty  is  "at  least 
to  put  himself  in  a  position  in  which,  at 
any  moment,  he  can  obtain  the  history 
from  childhood  of  every  soul  in  his  diocese, 
and  of  its  present  state.  Down  in  that 
back  street.  Bill  and  Nancy,  knocking  each 
other's  teeth  out!  Does  the  bishop  know 
all  about  it?  Has  he"his  eye  upon  them? 
Has  he  had  his  eye  upon  them?  Can  he 
circumstantially  explain  how  Bill  got  into 
the  habit  of  beating  Nancy  about  the  head? 
If  he  cannot,  he  is  no  bishop."  The  coun- 
try worker  finds  it  easy  to  fulfil  much  of 
Ruskin's  ideal.  The  trivial  happenings 
of  a  locality  are  not  difficult  to  know,  but 
the  causes  of  these  events  present  a  dif- 
ferent problem.     To   meet   the   need   of 

33 


34       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

knowing  "the  present  state"  of  the  com- 
munity has  arisen  the  rural  survey. 

The  survey  is  modern  in  a  significant 
sense.  Science,  with  its  eagerness  for  trust- 
worthy information,  and  business,  with  its 
emphasis  upon  fact,  both  in  these  days  en- 
force the  value  of  a  careful  study  of  com- 
munity life.  Everywhere  in  our  social  life 
mere  opinion  proves  worthless  and  an  in- 
creasing desire  is  felt  for  exact  knowledge. 
Thoughtful  people  appreciate  that  com- 
munity progress  requires  a  scientific  basis 
for  community  comparison  and  competi- 
tion, such  as  the  survey  provides.  The 
survey  appeals  to  the  rational,  to  the 
practical,  to  the  scientific.  It  keeps  no 
fellowship  with  exaggeration,  mere  senti- 
ment, or  selfish  exploitation.  It  is  honest 
in  its  searching  for  truth  and  just  in  its 
statements.  In  the  end  it  proves  that 
frankness  and  knowledge  do  more  for  a 
community's  prosperity  than  deceit  or 
guesses,  that  the  first  duty  of  any  com- 
munity is  to  know  itself. 

The  country  has  every  need  of  com- 


THE  MINISTER'S  EXPERIENCES       35 

munity  study  that  the  city  has.  The 
country  problems  are  the  great  problems. 
In  forces  and  opportunities  the  rural  life 
has  the  first  claim  for  attention  and  con- 
servation. The  making  of  a  rural  survey 
also  offers  a  satisfaction  that  the  more 
complex  and  changing  city  life  does  not 
permit.  Indeed,  an  authority  on  city  sur- 
veys has  recently  said  that  the  city  survey 
should  be  made  on  the  unit  basis,  one  sec- 
tion at  a  time.  The  rural  survey  gives  the 
best  possible  opportunity  to  test  the  re- 
sults of  the  social  study  by  attempts  to 
improve  the  country  life.  The  city  survey 
has  been  of  great  value;  the  rural  survey 
must  prove  of  even  greater  usefulness. 

With  reference  to  content  we  have  sur- 
veys of  rural  industries,  specific  rural  prob- 
lems, and  general  community  life.  The 
rural  survey  most  talked  about  is  the  study 
of  the  community  in  as  great  detail  as  pos- 
sible. There  is  real  need,  however,  of  sur- 
veys of  particular  industries  and  surveys  of 
some  specific  part  of  the  community  life. 

A  special  problem  that  can  best  be  met 


36   COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

by  a  preliminary  survey  to  discover  actual 
conditions  is  that  of  the  consolidated 
school.  Difficult  as  such  a  problem  often 
proves  in  actual  practice  when  a  com- 
munity is  divided  with  reference  to  the 
proposition  of  consolidation,  one  can  hardly 
question  that  the  first  safe  step  is  to  learn 
the  exact  facts  with  reference  to  the  prob- 
lem. This  usually  is  not  the  step  first 
taken,  but  it  is  always  the  wise  beginning. 
A  survey  needs  to  be  made  with  fore- 
thought. The  best  possible  preparation  is 
a  study,  by  a  group  of  public-spirited  and 
efficient  citizens,  of  surveys  that  have  been 
made  and  of  the  program  of  study  that  the 
particular  community  or  industry  demands. 
The  ground  to  be  covered,  the  methods  to 
be  followed,  the  organization  of  the  survey, 
and  the  uses  to  be  made  of  the  completed 
work,  all  need  to  be  carefully  planned.  The 
danger  of  having  persons  with  prejudices, 
axes  to  grind,  or  theories  to  defend  engage 
in  a  survey,  will  be  appreciated  by  anyone 
with  experience.  The  reformer  needs  first 
to  be  the  student,  and  the  exploiter  must 


THE  MINISTER'S  EXPERIENCES       37 

be  converted  to  the  responsibilities  of  se- 
rious investigation. 

The  organization  of  the  survey  is  of  large 
importance.  It  is  possible  to  obtain  ex- 
perts who  will  take  entire  charge  of  the 
project.  For  most  places  this  is  impracti- 
cal. Indeed,  there  are  some  real  advantages 
in  having  the  survey  made  by  citizens  of 
the  locality.  Many  ministers  deserve  great 
credit  for  the  interest  that  they  have  taken 
in  rural  surveys  that  already  have  been 
made.  However,  the  making  of  rural  sur- 
veys, without  assistance  from  public- 
spirited  citizens,  ought  not  to  be  forced 
upon  country  ministers.  Men  in  business 
in  rural  places  sometimes  make  the  serious 
mistake  of  not  being  really  interested  in 
community  prosperity  and  welfare.  Live 
country  business  men  of  foresight  will  ap- 
preciate the  opportunity  that  cooperation 
in  community  study  necessarily  brings. 
The  very  best  results  of  survey  organiza- 
tion can  probably  be  obtained  by  a  com- 
mittee, catholic  in  spirit,  representative  of 
the  community,  not  too  large  to  work,  and 


S8       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

willing  to  delegate  parts  of  the  investiga- 
tion to  persons  best  fitted  to  obtain  the 
necessary  information.  The  educational 
results  that  are  bound  to  come  to  those  who 
seriously  attempt  to  study  the  life  of  a 
rural  community  prove  of  unexpected  and 
permanent  value. 

Makers  of  rural  surveys  in  the  past  have 
given  too  little  attention  to  the  problem  of 
publicity.  A  survey  is  made  for  use.  A 
rural  survey  needs  most  of  all  to  be  appreci- 
ated by  the  people  of  the  community  that 
has  been  studied.  It  cannot  have  its  full 
success  if  it  appeals  only  to  the  rural  soci- 
ologist and  means  next  to  nothing  to  those 
who  are  personally  most  interested.  It  is 
clear,  therefore,  that  the  rural  survey  needs 
modern  advertising  and  they  who  are  en- 
gaged in  making  it  should  study  the  prob- 
lem of  making  it  popular.  Merely  to  print 
results  in  pamphlet  form  is  to  waste  human 
energy.  A  committee  ought  to  have  in 
hand  the  problem  of  publicity.  Churches, 
papers,  farmers'  organizations  should  be 
urged  to  help  make  the  results  of  the  in- 


THE  MINISTER'S  EXPERIENCES       39 

vestigation  known.  The  weekly  paper 
should  be  asked  to  print  parts  of  the  sur- 
vey in  various  issues.  Of  course  it  will  be 
printed  as  a  pamphlet  for  free  distribution. 
Even  here  a  mistake  in  the  form  in  which 
it  is  printed  will  decrease  its  value.  Not 
in  small  type  on  poor  paper,  but  in  as  at- 
tractive a  manner  as  possible,  it  ought  to 
be  spread  broadcast  among  the  people  it 
concerns. 

The  usual  rural  survey  is  of  great  value. 
A  better  investigation,  however,  is  one  that 
is  made  again  and  again.  The  community 
becomes  self-conscious  of  its  progress  and 
confident  of  its  strength  if  it  knows  from 
time  to  time  that  it  is  making  improve- 
ments and  gaining  social  efficiency.  A 
careful  survey  deserves  to  be  continued 
from  period  to  period.  A  rural  survey 
that  is  never  followed  by  later  investiga- 
tion must  lose  in  scientific  and  practical 
value.  The  problems  of  today  will  not 
remain  those  of  tomorrow.  A  rural  survey 
reports,  not  a  dead  thing,  but  a  growing, 
changing  life  of  human  beings.    Even  the 


40       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

best  rural  survey  will  lose  its  right  to  au- 
thority with  the  passing  of  time. 

The  purpose  and  character  of  the  survey 
must  determine  what  it  shall  contain.  The 
general  community  study  should  be  very 
broad.  In  it  should  be  found  all  possible 
information  that  has  social  value.  Ex- 
perience teaches  that  one  cannot  know  in 
advance  how  valuable  a  certain  gathering 
of  facts  may  prove.  It  is  easier  to  discard 
useless  information  than  it  is  to  repeat  the 
investigation  to  obtain  some  valuable 
knowledge  neglected  during  the  first  sur- 
vey. 

A  very  complete  and  suggestive  outline 
for  a  general  survey  is  published  in  Gil- 
lette's "Constructive  Rural  Sociology" — a 
book  that  everyone  interested  in  rural 
problems  needs  to  own.  The  Russell  Sage 
Foundation  has  a  department  prepared  to 
give  information  concerning  the  making  of 
social  surveys.  The  Presbyterian  Board  of 
Home  Missions  undertakes  the  making  of 
rural  surveys  and  has  on  file  excellent  rural 
surveys  that  already  have  been  made. 


THE  MINISTER'S  EXPERIENCES       41 

Probably  in  no  way  can  the  minister  of 
the  church  of  the  small  community  better 
conserve  his  social  experiences  than  by  his 
study  of  rural  surveys  and  his  interest  in 
the  surveying  of  his  own  field  of  labor. 
The  minister  who  cares  little  for  such  con- 
structive efforts  is  not  likely  to  influence 
very  deeply  or  for  long  the  community 
which  he  attempts  to  serve.  The  rural 
survey  is  not  a  cure-all  for  every  social 
difficulty  in  the  country,  but  it  fulfils  a 
very  useful  function  in  helping  the  rural 
worker  understand  his  problems.  It  is  a 
modern  tool  for  ministerial  service,  of  great 
value  when  properly  used. 

Besides  the  rural  survey  in  its  usual 
form,  there  is  another  opportunity  that 
comes  to  the  rural  worker  in  his  effort  to 
know  the  present  state  of  his  field,  and 
that  is  the  possibility  of  keeping  for  a 
term  of  years  significant  statistics.  The 
patient,  care-taking  recorder  of  definite 
social  facts,  chosen  because  of  personal 
interest  or  local  importance,  can  hardly 
fail  to  make  a  valuable  contribution  to  the 


42       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

science  of  rural  sociology.  Indeed,  it  is 
the  present  weakness  of  this  science  that 
it  has  not  a  larger  amount  of  social  statis- 
tics gathered  with  scientific  precision  by  in- 
terested workers.  Without  a  large  body  of 
such  observations,  rural  sociology  cannot 
take  its  proper  place  as  an  instrument  of 
progress. 

Recently  when  a  gathering  of  rural  work- 
ers were  asked  whether  they  had  a  rather 
definite  knowledge  of  social  and  moral  con- 
ditions in  their  several  communities  they 
all  responded  affirmatively  and  with  con- 
fidence, but  when  questions  calling  for 
specific  knowledge  were  asked  nearly  all 
at  once  admitted  their  ignorance.  What 
was  the  death  rate  of  the  community  for 
the  past  year?  What  had  been  the  record 
of  the  community  respecting  typhoid  dur- 
ing a  period  of  ten  years?  How  many  ille- 
gitimate children  had  been  born  during  the 
year?  Such  questions  could  not  be  an- 
swered. Although  the  religious  worker 
lives  in  a  world  of  law,  and  has  to  do  with 
moral  forces  governed  by  laws,  it  is  natural 


THE  MINISTER'S  EXPERIENCES       43 

for  him,  because  of  his  religious  interests 
and  his  lack  of  scientific  training,  to  neg- 
lect a  study  of  the  laws  that  are  operating 
socially  in  his  field  of  labor  and  the  events 
that  are  often  both  the  causes  and  results 
of  community  conditions. 

Every  social  worker  in  the  country,  nev- 
ertheless, has  good  reason  not  to  neglect  a 
study  of  social  forces.  In  the  making  of 
such  a  study  he  will  do  wisely,  moreover, 
not  to  trust  memory  to  make  comparisons 
between  periods  and  places,  but  to  make 
written  records,  realizing  that  memory  is 
fallible  because  of  the  very  nature  of  its 
habits.  In  keeping  statistics,  for  a  con- 
siderable penod,  of  things  that  seem  to 
him  useful  to  know  and  study,  the  rural 
worker,  besides  adding  to  his  information, 
develops  an  attitude  of  mind  which  tends 
to  make  him  expect  moral  forces  to  produce 
results.  A  ministerial  friend  recently  re- 
gretted that  he  had  not  continued  during 
his  five-year  stay  in  a  Massachusetts  parish 
to  keep  a  careful  record  of  the  careers  of  the 
institutional  children  placed  out  in  that 


44       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

country  town.  Many  children  were  placed 
in  families  in  his  community,  and  he  had  a 
very  decided  opinion  concerning  the  ad- 
vantages of  such  a  system  of  charity  and 
the  good  contribution  made  by  the  chil- 
dren to  the  social  life  of  the  place;  but  he 
had  to  admit  that  he  had  no  scientific  or 
satisfactory  basis  for  his  opinion. 

Of  course  some  time  is  required  for  such 
a  record  keeping  and  time  is  precious. 
However,  one  is  sure  of  getting  as  a  by- 
product of  one's  labor  a  mental  habit  of 
observing  causally  and  of  judging  critically 
the  products  of  social  activity.  The  min- 
ister cannot  record  the  histories  of  the 
children  who  are  placed  in  the  life  of  his 
community  from  institutions,  without  a 
new  concern  in  regard  to  their  welfare. 
Business  appreciates  this  habit  of  mind  be- 
cause it  is  necessary  to  business  efficiency, 
and  there  are  signs  that  religious  workers 
must  become  modern  in  this  important 
particular.  Gill  deserves  credit  for  his 
method  of  study  in  Gill  and  Pinchot*s 
"The  Country  Church."    Rural  sociology 


THE  MINISTER'S  EXPERIENCES       45 

can  never  perform  its  proper  service  until, 
in  addition  to  the  investigation  of  rural 
problems  by  government  experts  and  col- 
lege professors,  country  ministers  and 
teachers,  for  a  period  of  years,  record  ob- 
servations in  such  manner  as  to  justify 
publication  for  scientific  uses. 


IV 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OF  COMMUNITY 
SPIRIT 

Nothing  more  clearly  reveals  the  heart 
of  a  community  than  its  opinion  of  itself. 
Community  self-respect  is  not  less  im- 
portant than  that  of  the  individual,  for 
when  a  society  loses  its  confidence  in  its 
better  self,  it  loses  all  hope.  The  church  is 
vitally  interested  in  the  character  of  the 
community  mind,  since,  in  a  very  deep 
sense,  the  church  must  assume  consider- 
able responsibility  for  whatever  has  become 
characteristic  of  the  community  to  which  it 
ministers.  The  church  also  recognizes,  in 
proportion  to  the  clearness  with  which  it 
faces  its  social  opportunity,  that  by  in- 
fluencing public  opinion  it  is  able  most 
deeply  to  enter  the  life  of  the  community. 

Public  spirit  in  any  community  is  largely 
a  matter  of  leadership.  The  strong  men 
46 


COMMUNITY  SPIRIT  47 

and  women,  whether  their  strength  be  used 
for  good  or  evil,  make  the  village  what  it 
is.  It  is  the  social  business  of  the  church 
to  furnish  proper  leadership  and  to  train 
and  inspire  it.  The  church  also  is  in  duty 
bound  to  prepare  its  people  by  educational 
and  moral  instruction  for  a  hearty  support 
of  wholesome  leadership. 

How  quickly  at  times  the  stranger  can 
feel  the  community  atmosphere!  Its  dis- 
tinctive characteristics  are  soon  realized 
and  their  importance  recognized.  In  a  cer- 
tain New  England  community  the  general 
feeling  of  discouragement  would  impress 
the  least  sensitive  visitor.  Courage  appears 
dead.  It  is  no  surprise  to  hear  it  said 
everywhere,  "No  young  man  who  is  good 
for  anything  remains  here." 

Not  merely  is  the  church  greatly  inter- 
ested in  the  mood  of  the  community;  in  a 
most  real  sense  in  such  a  mood  the  church 
may  discover  its  own  social  value.  Years 
of  Christian  teaching  surely  ought  to  make 
some  impression  upon  the  general  thought 
of    the    community.      Unless    uncommon 


48       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

economic  changes  have  disrupted  the  nor- 
mal Hfe  of  the  people,  the  prevailing  atti- 
tude of  mind  in  a  community  reveals  the 
quality  of  the  social  influence  of  the 
church. 

A  difficulty  in  the  past  has  been  the  waste 
of  personal  influence  for  community  pro- 
gress as  a  result  of  the  narrow  interpreta- 
tion of  the  social  obligation  of  the  church. 
Strong  men  and  women  who  were  by  na- 
ture made  leaders  have  often  not  been 
enlisted  by  the  church  in  efforts  for  com- 
munity progress.  In  some  places  at  least 
the  welfare  of  the  church  itself,  in  a  most 
institutional  and  selfish  sense,  has  been  the 
obligation  pressed  forward,  and  there  has 
been  no  heroic  response.  In  traveling 
about,  one  sometimes  finds  a  community 
where  some  helpful  social  enterprise  has 
been  carried  out  with  success  by  persons 
who  have  received  little  support  from  the 
churches  and  who  have  recognized  little  in 
common  with  the  churches,  having  taken 
their  isolation  as  a  matter  of  course.  The 
church  of  the  small  community  fails  so- 


COMMUNITY  SPIRIT  49 

cially  when  it  is  not  catholic  enough  to  con- 
tribute Hberally  of  its  influence  in  specific 
encouragement  of  any  movement  for  social 
betterment,  whether  community-organized 
or  church-controlled. 

In  his  attack  upon  social  evils  and  his 
impatience  with  unwholesome  conditions, 
the  pastor  of  the  village  and  country  church 
needs  ever  to  be  most  careful  that  he  does 
not  destroy  community  self-respect.  De- 
structive criticism  may  be  both  honest  and 
just  without  being  wise.  Merely  to  be 
right  is  by  no  means  enough.  Nothing  re- 
quires greater  skill,  more  knowledge  of 
human  nature,  more  unselfish  thinking, 
than  criticism  and  denunciation.  The 
promise  of  better  things  is  based  upon 
proper  community  pride,  and  the  whole 
matter  is  made  hopeless  if  the  effort  for 
reform  kills  the  respect  of  the  community 
for  itself.  It  is  especially  important  to 
realize  that  the  first  effect  of  such  criticism 
may  not  disclose  its  deeper  result.  It  is 
possible  to  stir  protests  and  win  approval 
and   yet   poison   the   sources   of   effective 


50       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

reconstruction.  The  safe  method  em- 
phasizes what  may  be  as  well  as  declares 
what  is.  Indirect  criticism  is  more  profit- 
able and  lasting,  even  if  direct  denuncia- 
tion stings  more.  The  community  may 
come  to  accept  the  unhappy  picture  drawn 
of  it  as  its  true  likeness  and  give  up  all 
social  ambition.  In  the  process  of  what  is 
often  really  mere  fault-finding,  the  pastor 
may  destroy  the  basis  of  confidence,  en- 
thusiasm, and  courage  which  he  needs  for 
reconstruction. 

The  church  of  the  small  community  may 
conserve  public  spirit  by  emphasis  upon 
the  resources  of  the  community.  The 
people  should  be  made  conscious  of  every 
important  element  that  enters  their  social 
life.  Especially  ought  they  to  be  made 
familiar  with  the  past  history  of  the  com- 
munity. It  is  useless  to  expect  wholesome 
community  pride  when  nothing  is  given 
upon  which  to  build  pride.  Some  of  the 
least  enterprising  of  our  small  communities 
have  had  in  times  past  a  most  interesting 
history.      The  just  recognition  of  impor- 


COMMUNITY  SPIRIT  51 

tant  historical  events,  of  former  inhabitants 
of  power,  fame,  and  character,  provides 
substance  for  the  growth  of  good,  social 
self-respect.  Is  it  not  wisdom  for  the 
church  of  the  small  community  to  devote 
at  least  one  Sunday  a  year  to  a  considera- 
tion of  the  history  and  traditions  of  the 
locality? 

Surely  such  a  church  ought  not  to  end 
a  year  without  giving  over  one  Sunday  to 
the  consideration  of  the  progress  the  com- 
munity has  made  during  the  year.  Noth- 
ing will  do  more  to  develop  concrete  social 
thinking  among  church  people  than  a  com- 
munity progress  Sunday.  Upon  such  a 
day  attention  is  focused  upon  the  com- 
munity successes,  partial  or  complete,  upon 
the  evident  achievements  of  the  people  of 
the  place  in  various  departments  of  social 
life.  This  custom  in  any  community  in 
a  term  of  years  will  prove  helpful,  because 
it  tends  to  social  construction  and  confi- 
dence. 

An  open  forum  for  an  evening  Sunday 
service,  even  in  some  small  communities, 


52       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

has  proven  a  successful  means  of  making 
the  community  socially  self-conscious  and 
critical  without  becoming  well-satisfied  or 
pessimistic.  It  gives  the  forward  view  and 
provides  for  progress,  just  as  appreciation 
of  the  past  strengthens  community  self- 
respect.  Probably  no  social  effort  yields 
more  various  by-products  of  lasting  value 
than  an  interesting  open  forum.  In  the 
period  for  questions  it  has  the  democratic 
element  which  is  lacking  in  the  usual  ad- 
dress or  lecture  and  it  is  thereby  made 
more  impressive. 

Some  small  communities  need  especially 
to  consider  the  immigrant  that  has  entered 
its  life.  He  is  sometimes  left  outside  the 
socializing  spirit  of  the  community.  This 
causes  social  loss — at  times  serious.  The 
future  of  any  community  may  really  be 
in  the  hands  of  such  people  and  it  is  folly 
to  ask  the  public  school  by  itself  to  meet 
the  obligation  that  rests  upon  all  the  na- 
tive Americans.  The  church  that  wishes  to 
help  the  immigrants  often  will  find  that 
first  of  all  it  must  educate  its  own  people 


COMMUNITY  SPIRIT  53 

to  appreciate  and  respect  the  new-comers. 
This  is  no  difficult  task.  Every  national 
type  of  human  being  has  worth  enough  to 
be  valued  if  rightly  understood.  The  work 
of  the  church  may  be  to  interpret  the  his- 
tory and  characteristics  of  the  immigrants, 
that  the  community  life  may  be  organic 
and  Christian. 

No  pastor  seriously  undertakes  social 
service  in  the  small  community  without 
soon  finding  that  such  a  community  by 
itself  is  seriously  limited.  Important 
changes  that  will  build  up  wholesome 
spirit  in  our  smaller  villages  and  rural 
places  require  the  cooperation  of  several 
communities.  This  is  most  clearly  seen  in 
the  problem  of  recreation  and  entertain- 
ment, but  at  present  few  are  socially  edu- 
cated to  the  point  of  realizing  this.  The 
social  efforts  of  progressive  churches  are 
developing  a  new  need  of  cooperation,  a 
cooperation  between  communities.  Men 
are  eager  to  learn  of  the  experiences  of 
other  communities.  Enterprises  are  being 
considered  that  can  be  successfully  carried 


54       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

out  only  by  community  cooperation,  since 
they  are  too  costly  for  one  locality  to  un- 
dertake. An  example  of  this  is  the  attempt 
of  some  village  churches  to  find  a  way  to 
make  use  of  the  motion  picture  for  con- 
structive purposes.  This  need  of  a  new 
kind  of  cooperation  is  a  most  promising 
fact.  Communities  may  learn  of  one 
another  how  skilfully  to  employ  their 
moral  forces  and  may  enter  into  helpful 
cooperation  and  wholesome  rivalry  in  the 
conservation  of  community  resources. 


V 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OT  THE  FAMILY 

In  these  modern  days  the  family  finds 
its  largest  opportunity  in  the  country. 
Urban  social  conditions  hamper  the  healthy 
functioning  of  the  home  and  limit  its  effi- 
ciency. One  of  the  most  important  ad- 
vantages offered  those  living  in  the  coun- 
try as  compared  with  those  in  the  city  is 
the  greater  opportunity  provided  for  fam- 
ily association.  Members  of  the  family 
more  easily  realize  their  common  interests. 
More  time  is  spent  together,  resulting, 
under  favorable  circumstances,  in  a  richer 
fellowship  than  city  people  easily  obtain. 
Family  failures  are  very  apparent  in  the 
country,  and  the  influence  of  the  family  is 
usually  most  significant.  It  is  right,  there- 
fore, to  regard  the  family  as  a  great  social 
resource  in  the  country  and  to  insist  that 

55 


56       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

its  conservation  should  be  eagerly  desired 
by  all  who  have  rural  welfare  at  heart.  It 
is  impossible  to  consider  seriously  the  work 
of  the  country  church,  the  social  ministra- 
tion of  religion,  without  giving  thought  to 
the  problems  of  the  family  in  their  relation 
to  the  church. 

When  the  church  assumes  concrete  tasks, 
and,  with  the  spirit  of  social  passion,  covets 
powerful  social  resources,  it  turns,  as  by 
instinct,  to  the  family  as  one  of  its  great- 
est instruments  for  service.  When  on  the 
other  hand  it  undertakes  its  mission  with 
spiritual  and  moral  lassitude,  it  seldom  dis- 
covers definitely  and  significantly  how 
much  of  its  ethical  and  religious  oppor- 
tunity centers  in  the  home.  The  church 
that  conceives  itself  as  the  envoy  of  truth, 
goodness,  and  beauty  soon  uncovers  the 
potential  value  of  the  family  as  a  social 
organization  in  the  country.  Enlisting 
earnest  lovers  of  truth  in  fruitful  quests 
for  the  great  ideals  of  life  requires  atten- 
tion to  family  conditions.  Bringing  good- 
ness into  the  ordinary  life  where  it  can 


CONSERVATION  OF  THE  FAMILY      57 

prosper  and  win  vitality  demands  that  the 
family  shall  receive  its  rightful  recognition 
as  a  source  of  ethical  causes  that  quickly 
show  themselves  in  conduct.  Disclosing 
the  sweetness  and  health  that  come  from 
seeing  beauty  in  common  things  is  a  task 
that  needs  the  cooperation  of  deep,  sym- 
pathetic, inspiring  family  association.  It  is 
the  mark  of  the  conscientious  church  that 
it  thinks  of  its  mission  in  family  terms, 
that  it  expects  to  find  difficulties  and  re- 
sources as  the  result  of  family  influences. 

Neglect  of  the  family  weakens  the 
church.  By  failure  to  realize  concretely 
the  family's  social  importance,  the  church 
often  attacks  blindly  some  obvious  evil. 
Individuals  are  seldom  understood  cor- 
rectly apart  from  family  training.  Openly 
defiant  wickedness  feeds  upon  unwhole- 
some family  conditions,  drawing  its  vigor 
largely  from  the  weaknesses,  ignorance, 
and  selfishness  of  parents.  It  is  useless  to 
attempt  social  reform  by  merely  trying  to 
reconstruct  individual  motives  and  to  cor- 
rect personal  conduct.    The  great  fountain 


58       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

of  evil  needs  specific  attention.  It  is  in  its 
failure  clearly  to  analyze  problems  of  con- 
duct into  their  elementary  influences  that 
the  church  often  fails  in  effectiveness. 
That  the  bad  family  poisons  life  is  com- 
mon thought  indeed.  A  penetration  into 
the  way  that  a  definite  home  is  proving  a 
social  menace  is  far  from  common.  A 
specific  treatment  of  the  ills  of  the  family, 
after  an  analysis  carried  through  with 
scientific  precision,  is  most  unusual;  and 
yet  such  painstaking  diagnosis  enables  the 
church  to  conserve  its  moral  efforts  and  to 
multiply  its  successes. 

It  is  a  striking  fact,  that  has  not  been 
suflSciently  pondered  upon  by  religious 
people,  that  social  improvement  cannot  be 
permanent  when  the  family  does  not  re- 
ceive great  emphasis  as  a  fundamental  fac- 
tor in  any  social  situation.  Persuasion  and 
inspiration  may  stimulate  the  individual, 
but  no  activity  can  lift  up  a  social  group 
for  any  length  of  time  that  does  not  appre- 
ciate the  strategic  value  of  the  family. 
The  family  advance  measures  the  real  pro- 


CONSERVATION  OF  THE  FAMILY      50 

gress  of  the  movement,  and  registers  the 
success  of  the  reformation.  There  is  a 
temptation  felt  by  all  morally  earnest  peo- 
ple in  enthusiastic  social  service  to  treat 
individuals  as  detached  from  their  homes. 
It  is  easier  to  rescue  from  the  home  than  to 
rescue  the  home  from  its  misfortune.  Al- 
though such  service  brings  immediate  re- 
turns, and  occasionally  most  gratifying 
success,  it  is  clear  to  the  thoughtful  social 
worker  that  abiding  ethical  advance  re- 
quires the  improving  of  the  family.  This 
is  especially  true  in  the  small  community, 
because  of  the  enormous  functions  that  the 
family  still  performs.  The  church  that 
craves  efficiency  in  things  that  count  and 
that  wishes  to  do  service  that  wins  lasting 
results  will  surely  consider  the  family  ele- 
ment in  every  social  and  moral  problem. 

The  church  in  the  small  community  has 
no  greater  need  than  to  teach  its  constit- 
uency to  assume  specific  moral  service. 
Human  progress  depends  at  present  most 
of  all  upon  getting  good  purposes  expressed 
in  actual  service.      This  is  certainly  pro- 


60       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

foundly  true  of  the  people  who  come  con- 
stantly under  the  influence  of  the  Chris- 
tian churches.  There  is  more  goodness  at 
hand  than  is  being  utilized  in  efforts  really 
significant.  Any  attempt  to  bring  good 
people  face  to  face  with  concrete  responsi- 
bility that  involves  causal  influences  is  most 
wholesome.  When  the  church  of  the  small 
community  treats  the  family  as  a  training 
school  for  loyalty  to  responsibility,  it  min- 
isters to  a  great  need  in  the  lives  of  well- 
meaning  people.  It  directs  the  attention 
of  spiritually  ambitious  men  and  women  to 
immediate  opportunities  for  magnificent 
service  in  the  home.  The  family  becomes 
a  mission  field  and  the  parent  a  missionary. 
The  child,  awakening  to  cravings  of  his 
deeper  moral  nature,  is  shown  that  the 
home  is  the  first  testing-place  for  his  new 
ideals,  the  proper  place  for  honest  pur- 
poses to  become  actualized.  The  condition 
of  the  family  life  in  the  small  community 
makes  the  emphasis  of  the  moral  meaning 
of  the  home  most  natural.  He  who  faces 
things  as  they  are  and  is  morally  sincere. 


CONSERVATION  OF  THE  FAMILY      61 

grants,  as  he  looks  over  the  situation  in 
the  small  community,  that  the  family  is 
the  proper  place  for  moral  responsibility  to 
assume  its  obligations,  at  least  a  very 
necessary  place  for  moral  effort.  The 
home  has  always  had  a  large  social  func- 
tion as  a  school  for  morals,  and  it  is  the 
business  of  the  church  in  the  small  com- 
munity to  make  full  use  of  so  great  an 
instrument. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  any  effort 
on  the  part  of  the  church  to  consider  its 
service  in  the  community  with  special  ref- 
erence to  family  needs,  in  the  spirit  of 
science,  with  regard  to  the  operation  of 
cause  and  effect,  means  the  enriching  of 
the  inspirational  efforts  of  the  organiza- 
tion. Preaching  fails  to  carry  force  often 
because  it  is  so  subjective.  It  describes 
qualities  that  are  desirable  and  emphasizes 
methods  of  obtaining  these  qualities  only 
in  a  verbal  way.  The  objective  manner  of 
thinking  on  the  part  of  the  scientist,  who 
detects  conditions  and  precisely  adminis- 
ters what  the  occasion  demands,  is  not  un- 


62       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

commonly  absent  from  the  sermon.  In  an 
age  when  the  people  are  increasingly  being 
trained  to  take  an  objective  and  causal 
view  of  problems,  and  when  practicality  is 
a  virtue,  the  subjective  exhortation  ceases 
to  carry  conviction.  The  pastor  of  the 
country  church  who  treats  moral  difficul- 
ties from  a  causal  point  of  view,  and  who 
studies  the  family  life  as  a  source  of  moral 
causes,  gets  into  his  sermons  the  same 
concreteness  that  has  become  a  part  of 
his  personality.  He  never  covers  his  un- 
willingness or  his  inability  to  think  his 
moral  problems  down  to  their  fundamental 
elements  by  the  use  of  such  an  abstract 
term  as  "sin."  The  vocabulary  even  of 
the  sermon  is  protected  from  a  mere  emo- 
tional meaning — a  result  that  follows  the 
use  of  general  ideas — and  is  characterized 
by  specific  thinking  that  naturally  leads  to 
concrete  activity.  Such  preaching  com- 
mands attention. 

The  church  of  the  small  community  at 
times  assumes  a  dangerous  policy  toward 
the  family.     The  church  finds  itself  con- 


CONSERVATION  OF  THE  FAMILY      63 

fronted  with  the  sad  fact  that  the  family 
life  is  far  from  reasonable  eflSciency,  this 
failure  resulting  in  the  neglect  of  the  needs 
of  the  children  at  important  points.  It 
faces  a  situation  and  not  a  theory,  and  is 
therefore  deeply  tempted  to  meet  the  prob- 
lem by  methods  that  will  bring  immediate 
relief.  Unconsciously  it  undertakes  to  fill 
up  the  void  that  the  family  failures  are 
creating  in  the  lives  of  children  and  youth. 
The  profound  fact  is  that  the  family  is  re- 
lieved often  in  this  way  of  much  of  its 
responsibility.  If  the  school  and  church 
are  eager  to  assume  obligations  that  the 
home  fails  to  meet,  it  is  natural  for  the 
home  to  be  contented  in  spite  of  its  in- 
efficiency. And  yet  the  home  is  made 
healthy  only  by  trying  to  meet  its  serious 
responsibilities.  Parents  respond  with  an 
easy  conscience  to  the  invitation  to  give 
over  some  of  their  proper  obligations,  and 
thus  new  needs  are  created  for  the  school 
and  church  to  attempt  to  satisfy.  The  end 
of  such  an  evolution  may  be  the  elimination 
of  the  home  as  an  efficient  social  organiza- 


64       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

tion.  When  the  attack  that  is  foreshad- 
owed by  many  currents  in  present-day 
thinking  is  made  upon  the  home,  its  de- 
fenders may  find  that  it  has  already  lost 
much  from  its  important  functions.  It  is 
bad  business  for  the  church  to  rob  the 
home  of  any  of  its  responsibility  by  a 
benevolent  effort  to  fill  the  void  that  fam- 
ily carelessness  is  causing.  The  slower  but 
wiser  policy  calls  for  a  heroic  attempt  to 
invigorate  the  family,  and  to  make  it 
morally  self-supporting.  This  does  not,  of 
course,  mean  that  the  church  should  not 
work  with  children;  it  means  that  such 
work  must  not  be  a  method  of  relieving 
the  home  of  service  it  is  equipped  to 
perform. 

The  church  must  teach  the  adults  that 
the  home  cannot  safely  attempt  to  farm 
out  its  proper  responsibilities  to  any  social 
organization  whatsoever.  Conditions  in 
the  small  community  make  it  possible  for 
such  teaching  to  obtain  significant  results. 
The  home  is  by  no  means  hopelessly  out- 
rivaled; it  still  has  courage  to  assume  its 


CONSERVATION  OF  THE  FAMILY      Q5 

normal  tasks.  It  is  easy  indeed,  however, 
for  the  church  to  encourage  the  parents  in 
their  thinking  that  a  larger  and  larger  part 
of  the  life  of  the  children  must  be  given 
over  to  experts  who  work  through  special 
institutions  or  to  persons  who  have  special 
gifts  with  children.  Home-love  is  still  the 
chief  need  of  the  child — intelligent  affec- 
tion. The  church  of  the  small  community 
proves  its  wisdom  when  it  works  through 
the  home  rather  than  for  the  home. 


VI 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OF  RECREATION 

There  is  a  very  general  and  an  increasing 
recognition  of  the  need  of  providing  rural 
young  people  with  opportunities  for  whole- 
some play,  and  it  promises  happier  and 
healthier  days  for  country  youth.  This 
does  not  mean,  of  course,  that  the  demand 
for  play  is  something  modern.  Indeed,  the 
facts  are  otherwise.  Man  has  been  a 
player  from  the  beginning.  Even  animals 
play.  The  savage  also  gives  his  testimony 
regarding  the  great  human  need  of  play, 
for,  however  brutal  his  habits  and  low  his 
standard  of  living,  he  plays,  plays  a  great 
deal,  and  finds  in  his  play  a  deep  satisfac- 
tion, and  the  gain  from  his  play  is  not 
altogether  personal,  for  in  primitive  life 
play  performs  a  most  important  social  ser- 
vice. Although  there  have  been  days  in 
the  past  when  play  has  been  called  wicked 

66 


CONSERVATION  OF  RECREATION   67 

frivolity,  yet  even  at  such  times  men  have 
needed  recreation  and  have  found  it,  con- 
trary to  their  theory,  in  their  rehgious  ac- 
tivities in  such  forms  as  festivities,  pa- 
geants, and  passion  plays. 

Although  play  is  not  by  any  means  a 
modern  invention,  nevertheless  we  are  just 
beginning  to  understand  its  social  value. 
It  has  in  recent  times  been  too  much 
thought  of  as  significant  only  for  the  pleas- 
ure of  the  individual.  Since  it  has  been 
highly  organized  and  commercialized,  how- 
ever, recreation  has  appeared  in  its  true 
light.  Thinking  people  have  been  forced 
to  see  that  play  is  a  great  social  influence, 
a  most  potent  factor  in  building  or  de- 
stroying character,  and,  since  the  appetite 
for  play  is  stimulated  by  all  the  skill  at  the 
command  of  great  modern  business  or- 
ganizations, it  is  being  clearly  understood 
that  the  child,  if  society  is  to  be  whole- 
some, must  be  protected  and  guided  in  his 
play.  The  church,  therefore,  is  not  indif- 
ferent to  the  problem  of  recreation,  and 
especially  is  this  true  of  the  efficient  church 


68       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

in  the  country  and  small  community.  Con- 
ditions of  modern  life,  requiring  relief  and 
recuperation  from  nervous  strain,  demand 
play  increasingly  in  some  form  for  adults, 
and  it  is  no  longer  possible  to  consider  the 
recreation  problem  in  either  city  or  coun- 
try as  merely  having  to  do  with  the  wel- 
fare of  children.  Play,  therefore,  has  be- 
come a  community  problem,  and  one  that 
has  to  do  with  the  interests  of  all  the  peo- 
ple of  the  community. 

The  church  in  the  small  community  has, 
or  at  least  may  have,  much  influence  upon 
the  recreation  of  the  community  and  its 
responsibility  is  in  proportion  to  its  oppor- 
tunity. It  may,  of  course,  as  churches  at 
times  have — happily  not  often  of  late — set 
itself  in  opposition  to  recreation.  In  pleas- 
ure, however  clean  and  wholesome,  refresh- 
ing and  socializing,  it  may  see  merely  a 
trivial  attitude,  a  frivolous  spirit.  It  may, 
though  fortunately  it  seldom  does,  look 
upon  all  play  as  an  enemy  of  serious  moral 
character,  and  may  frown  upon  amusement 
at  every  opportunity.    This  attitude  on  the 


CONSERVATION  OF  RECREATION      69 

part  of  the  church  creates,  in  the  degree 
that  it  is  successful,  a  void  in  the  hfe  of  the 
people,  especially  of  the  young,  and  by  sad 
experience  wise  people  have  discovered  that 
such  an  emptiness  not  seldom  becomes  a 
source  of  moral  corruption.  Rural  social 
history  has  proven  that,  when  the  church 
has  been  hostile  toward  recreation,  amuse- 
ment has  become  an  instrument  in  the 
hands  of  the  evil  forces  and  an  instrument 
of  power  over  young  life.  The  church,  also 
in  times  past,  because  of  its  proper  opposi- 
tion to  unwholesome  amusements,  has  for- 
gotten the  need  of  replacing  evil  recreation 
with  good,  and  has  been  content  with 
merely  denouncing  that  for  which  a  sub- 
stitute needed  to  be  found. 

A  more  common  mistake  on  the  part  of 
the  church  of  the  small  community  has 
been  a  practical  indifference  to  recrea- 
tional needs.  The  church  has  failed  to 
appreciate  in  such  cases  the  importance 
that  amusement  has  as  a  source  of  moral, 
social  influence.  Perhaps  the  problem  of 
evil  recreation  has  been  talked  about;  it 


70       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

may  even  have  become  a  source  of  worry, 
but  no  eflfective  action  in  regard  to  the 
matter  has  been  carried  out.  Good  peo- 
ple have  forgotten  that  the  power  for  evil 
contained  in  bad  amusements  is  clear  proof 
of  the  great  social  service  that  proper 
recreation  may  perform. 

The  only  right  attitude  for  a  Christian 
church  to  take  toward  recreation  is  that 
of  sympathy  and  support.  It  is  in  duty 
bound  to  appreciate  so  great  a  source  of 
social  influence,  and  to  attempt  its  pro- 
tection from  the  preying  selfishness  of  com- 
mercial exploitation.  Its  mission  in  society 
is  best  accomplished  by  its  taking  strategic 
possession  of  the  places  where  human  char- 
acter is  most  naturally  and  profoundly  in- 
fluenced, and  certainly  one  such  place  is 
recreation. 

When  the  church  of  the  small  community 
assumes  the  proper  attitude  toward  the 
problem,  it  is  called  upon  to  study  how  to 
make  its  influence  count.  It  often  awakens 
to  the  fact — and  it  is  real  spiritual  heroism 
to  admit  the  situation — that  its  influence 


CONSERVATION  OF  RECREATION   71 

upon  the  community  recreations  is  very  lit- 
tle; indeed,  it  may  discover  that  it  has  not 
even  realized  the  character  of  some  of  the 
most  significant  recreations  that  have  got- 
ten into  the  community  life. 

In  its  attempt  to  meet  the  recreation 
problem,  the  church  faces  the  question 
whether  it  must  itseK  provide  wholesome 
recreation.  The  answer  depends  upon  cir- 
cumstances. In  most  cases  it  is  safer  and 
wiser  for  the  church  to  inspire  other  or- 
ganizations to  take  over  the  problem.  In 
such  cases  the  church  best  serves  by  its 
teaching.  There  are  advantages  in  the 
school  becoming  the  recreational  center,  or 
in  some  new  organization  being  created  to 
meet  the  specific  problem.  The  church  can 
then  assume  the  responsibility  of  keeping 
the  community  interested,  in  developing 
the  craving  for  good  forms  of  play. 

The  distinctly  rural  church  has  the 
largest  opportunity  along  these  lines  of 
service  at  present,  because  it  can  so 
quickly  make  its  influence  count.  The 
rural  young  people  are  most  likely  to  suffer 


72       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

from  a  lack  of  proper  recreation.  The 
church  is  fortunate  that  can  turn  to  the 
Young  Men's  Christian  Association  for  ex- 
pert help  in  solving  the  recreation  problem 
of  the  community.  When  there  are  sev- 
eral churches  in  the  same  community,  there 
is  the  greatest  need  of  constructive  work 
being  carried  on  by  an  organization  that 
can  unite  all  the  Christian  organizations  in 
a  common  social  service.  It  is  most  unfor- 
tunate in  such  circumstances  if  each  church 
strives  to  organize  recreation  for  its  own 
people  by  itself. 

The  mistake  is  still  being  made  in  many 
small  villages  and  country  places  of  think- 
ing of  play  as  a  need  only  for  the  young 
people  and  children.  In  rural  life  espe- 
cially, emphasis  must  be  placed  upon  adult 
recreation.  Social  health,  mental  vigor, 
moral  sanity,  demand  more  play,  more 
freedom,  more  relief  from  labor  for  adults 
living  and  working  in  the  country.  Often 
rest  from  labor  means  cheap  dissipation  or 
empty  idleness.  A  great  social  vitalizing 
experience  is  thrown  away  because  no  ef- 


CONSERVATION  OF  RECREATION      73 

fort  is  made  to  conserve  adult  recreational 
needs. 

It  is  not  strange  to  hear  the  failure  of 
cooperation  among  rural  people  charged  up 
to  their  lack  of  play  experience.  We  have 
every  reason  to  regard  the  statement  seri- 
ously, for  play  teaches  cooperation  and 
creates  friendly  feeling  as  few  things  can. 
It  certainly  seems  true  in  some  rural  places 
that  there  is  less  neighborhood  recreation 
and  fellowship  than  there  formerly  was. 
There  has  perhaps  been  created  a  taste  for 
urban  stimulating  pleasures  and  a  failure  to 
realize  the  neighborhood  opportunities  that 
contain  deeper  satisfactions  than  the  city 
affords.  Here  and  there  we  find  foolish 
efforts  to  import  the  city  amusements  into 
the  country  rather  than  an  honest  effort  to 
discover  the  possibilities  of  the  country  it- 
self. In  the  end  the  country  must  find  its 
own  joys  or  grow  barren. 

There  appears  to  be  one  form  of  recrea- 
tion that  churches  in  small  villages  and 
rural  places  ought  to  encourage  greatly, 
and  that  is  reading  and  study  clubs.    It  is 


74       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

no  secret  that  some  of  our  most  serious 
readers  are  not  in  the  cities,  but  in  the 
country.  The  conditions  of  rural  Hfe  tend 
to  deepen  the  impression  of  whatever  is 
read.  It  is  a  great  pity  that  often  the 
reading  is  of  Httle  worth  because  the  ma- 
terial itself  has  almost  no  value.  Serious 
reading  of  trivial,  perhaps  cheap,  literature 
represents  a  very  great  loss,  and  the  com- 
munity church  needs  to  conserve  the  men- 
tal cravings  of  its  people.  There  is  need  of 
more  study  and  reading  clubs  in  the  coun- 
try— the  getting  together  of  people  who  like 
to  read  along  similar  lines  that  they  may 
profit  from  their  intellectual  fellowship. 
The  splendid  success  of  such  organizations 
in  some  rural  towns,  often  as  a  result  of  the 
influence  of  the  pastor  of  a  church,  proves 
how  very  valuable  this  mental  form  of  rec- 
reation may  prove  in  the  social  life  of 
country  people. 


VII 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL  COM- 
MUNITY AND  THE  CONSERVA- 
TION OF  PHYSICAL  HEALTH 

The  country  has  the  conditions  of  health. 
Rural  health,  nevertheless,  is  not  in  pro- 
portion to  the  opportunities  offered  bj^  the 
wholesome  environment  of  country  people. 
There  appears  to  be  a  difference  of  opinion 
respecting  rural  health  as  compared  with 
that  of  urban  people.  An  eminent  statis- 
tician expresses  the  opinion  that  "the  mor- 
tality-rates from  all  important  diseases  are 
measurably  lower  among  American  farmers 
than  among  numerous  employments  typi- 
cal of  modern  city  life  in  the  United  States. 
The  statistical  evidence,  therefore,  is  quite 
conclusive  that  in  the  registration  area  of 
the  United  States,  which,  however,  excludes 
most  of  the  rural  sections  of  western  and 
southern  states,  the  mortality -rate  from  all 
causes  combined,  and  from  practically  all 

75 


76       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

the  important  causes,  is  much  less  in  the 
rural  districts  than  in  the  cities."'  A  report 
made  for  the  United  States  Bureau  of 
Education  concerning  a  survey  made  of 
eight  eastern  states  is  said  to  give  "over- 
whelming evidence  against  the  healthful- 
ness  of  the  country  as  compared  with  the 
city."2  "The  Wisconsin  Anti-tuberculosis 
League,  a  year  or  so  ago,  made  a  very 
careful  and  exact  sanitary  survey  of  a 
certain  rural  district  in  that  state,  relative 
to  the  amount  of  this  disease,  and  found 
that  in  some  parts  of  this  district  the 
death-rate  from  tuberculosis  exceeded  that 
of  Milwaukee,  Wisconsin's  largest  city/*^ 
In  regard  to  one  fact  there  is,  however, 
general  agreement — tPie  health  of  rural  peo- 
ple is  not  so  great  as  it  ought  to  be,  in  the 
light  of  the  opportunities  provided  by  the 
country  for  health. 

ip.  L.  HofFmann,  "Rural  Health  and  Welfare," 
pp.  12,  9. 

2  Report  of  National  Conference  of  Charities  and 
Corrections  1914,  p.  154. 

8  Bashore,  "Overcrowding  and  Defective  Housing  in 
Rural  Districts,"  p.  88. 


PHYSICAL  HEALTH  77 

Doubtless  also  there  is  little  question 
that  country  people  are  less  concerned 
with  problems  of  health  than  they  need  to 
be.  It  is  too  often  assumed  without  rea- 
son that  rural  conditions  in  regard  to 
health  are  satisfactory  enough  not  to  re- 
quire community  investigation.  As  a 
result,  we  have  little  public  effort  for 
improvement.  In  urban  centers  much 
progress  is  being  made  in  the  conservation 
of  public  health  and  there  are  equal  mo- 
tives for  cooperative  effort  in  the  country 
along  the  same  lines.  The  Country  cannot 
safely  rely  upon  its  natural  advantages.  In 
such  effort  for  improved  conditions  of  living 
the  church  has  a  clear  duty.  It  should  lead. 

The  church  can  be  indifferent  only  be- 
cause of  social  ignorance.  It  confesses  fatal 
narrowness  of  spiritual  vision  when  it  re- 
fuses to  consider  physical  welfare  as  in- 
cluded in  its  community  mission.  It 
blinds  itself  to  the  far-reaching  results  of 
poor  health,  of  harmful  habits  of  living. 
Seldom  indeed  in  these  days  can  one  find 
a  church  consciously  assuming  such  a  po- 


78       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

sition,  but  too  frequently  we  find  churches 
in  the  country  that  act  as  if  they  had  little 
responsibility  for  the  physical  well-being  of 
the  people. 

The  community-spirited  church  regards 
the  problem  of  health  as  a  moral  matter. 
Unnecessary  suffering  and  disease  mean 
a  loss  to  the  community  of  its  human 
resources.  Human  personality  is  too  val- 
uable to  be  lost  to  the  community  as  a 
result  of  unwholesome  living  conditions, 
brought  about  by  public  indifference,  ig- 
norance, and  selfishness.  Suffering  reduces 
human  eflSciency,  it  lowers  the  vitality  of 
the  contribution  made  to  the  community 
by  the  unfortunate  sufferer.  Suffering 
which  results  from  conditions  that  are  the 
expression  of  a  low  public  intelligence  and 
sense  of  responsibihty  becomes  a  moral 
matter  by  its  very  existence,  for  it  is  the 
business  of  the  church  to  minister  to  whole- 
some happiness. 

Indeed,  from  a  most  narrow  point  of 
view,  the  church  is  interested  in  problems 
of  health,  for  some  diseases  have  a  most 


PHYSICAL  HEALTH  79 

definite  moral  significance.  Consumption, 
for  example,  has  often  a  most  remarkable 
influence  upon  the  sex  life  of  the  individual. 
Passion  often  becomes  abnormally  intense 
as  a  result  of  the  development  of  tubercu- 
losis. Science  shows  also  that  alcoholism 
is  at  times  the  result  of  a  diseased  condi- 
tion of  the  body.  Paresis,  a  nervous  disease 
usually  resulting  from  syphilis,  often  has  a 
clear  series  of  moral  results  of  great  social 
importance.  A  man  of  high  social  standing, 
of  good  reputation,  perhaps  a  man  of  great 
service  socially,  begins  suddenly  to  show  a 
most  unexplainable  change  in  personal 
habits  and  in  morals.  He  becomes  a  scan- 
dal in  the  community  and  perhaps  as  a 
consequence  some  church  is  brought  into 
disrepute.  And  the  entire  moral  change  is 
merely  a  part  of  the  symptoms  of  this  ter- 
rible disease,  paresis,  caused  by  a  syphilitic 
infection  many  years  previously.  Even 
when  the  church  accepts  little  concrete  re- 
sponsibility for  the  health  of  the  com- 
munity, it  has  to  take  account  of  problems 
that  are  born  of  bad  physical  conditions. 


80       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

Modern  science  is  making  this  relation  be- 
tween morals  and  health  increasingly  clear. 
The  efficient  Christian  church  has  in  the 
small  community  a  very  definite  and  serious 
work  that  it  ought  to  do  for  the  health  of 
the  people.  It  surely  ought  to  teach  in 
concrete  terms  a  proper  respect  for  the 
body.  This  teaching  cannot  safely  be  lim- 
ited to  instruction  in  regard  to  two  or 
three  physical  vices.  Respect  for  the  body 
must  be  cultivated  by  attention  to  many 
facts  concerning  the  needs,  uses,  and  dan- 
gers of  one's  physical  self.  Some  of  this 
teaching  may  be  undertaken  wisely  in  co- 
operation with  the  doctor;  some  of  it  may 
be  a  by-product  of  an  interesting  and  prac- 
tical sermon.  Without  doubt  some  in- 
struction should  be  carried  on  by  special 
classes — perhaps  as  a  part  of  the  Sunday 
school  work.  Christianity  teaches  that  the 
body  is  the  temple  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  and 
no  church  can  do  its  proper  service  in  the 
small  community  when  it  does  not  concern 
itself  thoughtfully  and  broadly  with  the 
physical  welfare  of  the  people. 


PHYSICAL  HEALTH  81 

It  is  even  necessary  at  the  present  time  in 
many  country  places  that  country  people 
be  taught  in  an  interesting  and  sane  way 
the  causes  of  some  of  the  most  important 
diseases.  The  church  ought  either  to  in- 
spire such  an  undertaking  or  assume  the 
task  itself.  The  sad  story  of  lung  houses, 
overcrowding,  and  insanitary  conditions 
among  rural  people  has  been  forcefully  and 
briefly  told  by  Dr.  B ashore  in  his  recent 
book,  "Overcrowding  and  Defective  Hous- 
ing in  Rural  Districts."  These  unnecessary 
conditions  in  the  country  demand  very 
practical  instruction.  The  church  can  eas- 
ily bring  about  some  method  by  which 
this  information  respecting  rural  physical 
dangers  and  needs  can  be  given  and  driven 
home.  Rural  people  of  intelligence  are 
prone  to  consider  bad  houses  and  insani- 
tary conditions  as  individual  problems. 
This  is  by  no  means  true.  Germs  are  no 
respecter  of  persons.  Conditions  that 
menace  an  individual  or  a  family  also  en- 
danger the  entire  community. 

It  is  particularly  important  in  the  coun- 


82       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

try  to  study  the  physical  needs  of  children. 
Infant  mortality  is  a  problem  in  the  coun- 
try as  certainly  as  in  the  city,  and  it  must 
be  solved  in  both  places  by  publicity  and 
education.  The  country  school  is  very  bad 
indeed  with  reference  to  its  influence  phys- 
ically upon  the  growing  children,  as  no  one 
can  doubt  who  knows  the  rural  school  per- 
sonally. It  is  severe  criticism,  considering 
the  physical  resources  of  the  country  school, 
when  Dr.  Bashore  aflSrms  "that  all  city 
children,  no  matter  what  city  or  where, 
attend  school  under  sanitary  conditions  far 
ahead  of  anything  in  the  country."  This 
problem  of  the  rural  child  and  his  school 
surroundings  is  a  vital  one  for  the  church, 
for  from  the  school  come  the  human  re- 
sources upon  which  the  organization  later 
must  depend.  Church  indifference  to  the 
physical  needs  of  the  school  condemns  the 
church  as  socially  inefficient  and  blind  to 
its  large  moral  mission.  Many  a  school- 
man will  contrast  the  city  open-air  school 
with  the  sickening  atmosphere  of  some 
rural  school  which  has  never  been  forgotten 


PHYSICAL  HEALTH  83 

because  of  the  impression  received  upon 
visiting  it.  It  is  a  sad  and  discouraging 
illustration  of  the  character  of  some  of  our 
rural  teaching  that  in  such  a  school  a 
limited  amount  of  instruction  regarding 
physical  hygiene  is  required  by  the  law  of 
the  state. 

Emphasis  upon  matters  that  concern 
public  health  is  wholesome  in  teaching  the 
people  to  undertake  community  self-ex- 
amination. Needs  can  be  easily  found  and 
made  forceful  when  they  are  physical  in 
character.  A  community  often  turns  from 
an  honest  self-examination  at  this  point  to 
the  consideration  of  matters  equally  im- 
portant, but  not  so  easily  seen.  The 
church  itself  may  study  its  social  value  by 
an  investigation  of  public  health  conditions 
and  its  influence  in  reforming  these.  If  it 
has  no  real  public  influence  respecting  such 
apparent  needs,  it  may  well  question 
whether  its  spiritual  service  is  deeply  suc- 
cessful. Surely  if  it  has  no  ability  to  make 
wholesome  physical  conditions,  it  cannot 
assume  that  it  is  a  moral  force  in  the  com- 


84       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

munity.  "If  in  the  rural  districts  we  can 
substitute  common  community  activities 
for  self-centered  interests,  kindliness  for 
suspiciousness,  helpfulness  for  indifference; 
if  we  can  inspire  a  better  spirit  of  coopera- 
tion in  agricultural  pursuits,  in  civic  bet- 
terment, in  home-making  and  child -raising; 
in  other  words,  if  we  can  bring  to  these 
people  a  wholesome  knowledge  of  hygiene 
in  the  best  understanding  of  the  word,  it 
will  mean  to  them  a  richer,  fuller  life,  ex- 
pressing itself  in  a  generation  of  sound, 
healthy  people."  These  words  of  a  lover 
of  country  welfare  contain  a  truth,  but  the 
better  plan  is  to  have  a  church  of  vision, 
courage,  and  social  passion  lead  the  people 
themselves  to  a  higher  standard  of  physical 
being. 

The  honest  church  will  at  least  attend  to 
the  health  problems  that  center  about  its 
own  building.  There  can  be  no  great 
promise  in  a  sermon  on  taking  good  care  of 
the  body  preached  to  people  who  are 
breathing  poison  as  a  result  of  vicious  in- 
difference to  or  ignorance  of  the  matter  of 


PHYSICAL  HEALTH  85 

ventilation.  He  who  has  been  invited  to 
speak  in  a  dirty  church  building,  pointedly 
disclosing  the  character  of  an  inefficient 
janitor  and  a  careless  people,  will  confess 
to  a  feeling  of  depression  after  looking 
about  the  building.  The  clean  and  the 
sanitary  church  building  is  a  prerequisite  to 
any  successful  effort  for  the  bettering  of 
public  health  conditions  by  the  church.  In 
conserving  rural  health  resources,  the 
church  often  awakens  to  the  fact  that  it 
has  itself  been  negligent  with  reference  to 
its  own  institutional  influence. 


VIII 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OF  MENTAL 
HEALTH 

In  our  present  social  life  the  problem  of 
mental  abnormality  looms  large.  Mental 
disorder,  one  of  the  most  dangerous  and 
pathetic  of  human  afflictions,  is  becoming 
painfully  frequent.  Although  we  have  rea- 
son to  suppose  that  insanity  is  more  com- 
mon in  the  city  than  in  the  country,  it  is, 
nevertheless,  a  serious  problem  for  the 
country  community.  The  layman,  in 
thinking  of  mental  abnormality,  has  in 
mind  usually  the  idea  of  insanity  ex- 
pressed in  clear  and  forceful  peculiarities 
of  conduct.  Because  of  this  he  often  fails 
to  appreciate  a  great  many  cases  of  mental 
unsoundness  which  express  themselves  in 
foolish,  anti-social,  or  immoral  behavior. 
The  problem  of  mental  health  is  larger 
than  the  problem  of  mental  sanity  in  the 


MENTAL  HEALTH  87 

popular  sense.  The  student  of  the  mind  is 
finding  increasingly  that  mental  instability 
is  the  real  cause  of  problems  of  conduct 
that  have  been  considered  merely  moral  in 
character. 

All  conduct,  whether  good  or  bad,  is  re- 
lated to  mental  states,  and  is  therefore  in- 
fluenced by  the  normality  or  abnormality 
of  the  mind.  It  is  natural  that  unsound- 
ness of  mind  should  express  itself  in  ab- 
normal conduct  of  various  forms.  Modern 
science  reveals  the  relation  between  mental 
disorder  or  instability  and  the  unwhole- 
some conduct  which  is  characteristic  of 
the  vicious  and  delinquent  classes.  It  is 
clearly  shown  that  there  is  a  direct  connec- 
tion between  disordered  mental  condition 
and  alcoholism,  vagrancy,  prostitution, 
pauperism,  and  crime.  Studies  of  criminal 
classes  are  increasingly  placing  emphasis 
upon  the  mental  abnormality  which  is  the 
real  cause  of  the  anti-social  conduct.  In- 
vestigations made  by  experts  in  clinic  psy- 
chology are  changing  the  conception  of  the 
sociologist  regarding  crime.     Science  has. 


88       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

for  example,  recently  made  a  statement 
very  different  from  its  earlier  opinion  con- 
cerning the  causes  of  prostitution. 

The  new  significance  that  mental  un- 
wholesomeness  has  in  social  life  as  a  result 
of  the  modern  teaching  of  science  makes 
the  whole  problem  of  mind  disorder  of  im- 
portance to  the  church  of  the  small  com- 
munity. The  efficient  church  attempts  to 
deal  with  its  problems  in  the  light  of 
present  knowledge  and  to  treat  every  case 
from  the  viewpoint  of  causation.  It  fol- 
lows, therefore,  that  the  church  must  give 
attention  to  the  growing  mental  instability 
that  produces  so  many  of  the  concrete  per- 
sonal misfortunes.  Its  interest  in  the  re- 
sults of  mental  disorder  forces  it  to  take 
an  intelligent  interest  in  the  cause  itself. 

It  might  seem  at  first  thought  as  if  the 
church  could  do  nothing  to  conserve  the 
mind.  Valuable  as  it  would  be  for  a  clearer 
insight  into  the  nature  of  certain  moral 
difficulties,  the  knowledge  of  the  signifi- 
cance of  mental  instability  might  seem  of 
no  greater  use.    This,  however,  is  not  true. 


MENTAL  HEALTH  89 

The  service  of  the  church,  especially  in  the 
small  community,  is  necessarily  related  to 
the  problem  of  mind  conservation.  It  is 
clearly  in  the  power  of  the  church  to  do  its 
part  to  lessen  the  tragedies  of  life  that 
appear  in  the  form  of  mind  disease.  On 
the  other  hand,  who  can  doubt  that  care- 
less and  unwholesome  church  activity  adds 
somewhat  to  the  influences  that  operate  to 
increase  mind  disorder? 

Troubles  of  the  mind  are  often  the  result 
of  bad  habits.  The  expert  makes  much  of 
the  value  of  good  training  as  a  means  of 
decreasing  insanity  and  nervous  diseases. 
The  habits  that  the  child  forms  or  fails  to 
form  may  decide  years  later  whether  the 
adult  is  to  be  mentally  or  nervously  sound 
or  not.  It  surprises  the  layman  to  hear 
the  doctor  insist  that  the  relief  of  neuras- 
thenia largely  depends  upon  the  getting  rid 
of  bad  habits  and  the  creation  of  new 
habits.  The  significance  of  habit  forma- 
tion in  the  conservation  of  the  mind  brings 
again  to  the  attention  of  the  church  of  the 
small  community  its  relation  to  the  home. 


90       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

Parents  help  to  injure  the  mental  health  of 
their  children  because  they  do  not  under- 
stand the  problem  of  child  training.  Often 
they  merely  lack  an  appreciation  of  the 
significance  of  the  events  of  early  child  life. 
It  would  seem  as  if  the  church  that  covets 
service  must  find  in  the  need  of  awakening 
the  home  to  its  responsibilities  a  very  in- 
viting opportunity. 

There  is  one  type  of  habit  formation  that 
the  church  especially  needs  to  understand 
— the  habit  of  day-dreaming.  Thinking 
that  satisfies  the  person  without  working 
itself  out  into  real  activity  is  dangerous  by 
its  very  nature.  Modern  psychology,  the 
Freudian  psychology  especially,  makes  this 
fact  very  clear.  Insanity  itself  is  at  times 
the  relief  that  an  extreme  kind  of  day- 
dreaming gives  in  contrast  with  the  painful 
experiences  of  reality.  The  church  needs 
to  impress  this  fact,  not  only  upon  teach- 
ers and  parents,  but  also  upon  its  own 
conscience.  The  pastor  especially  must 
meditate  upon  the  significance  of  the  day- 
dreaming weakness  in  human  life,  for  the 


MENTAL  HEALTH  91 

church  itself  may  be  given  to  the  day- 
dreaming tendency.  Religion  may  be  used 
to  cover  up  an  unwillingness  to  face  real- 
ity, to  meet  the  moral  needs  of  the  situa- 
tion. The  minister  must  expect  persons  of 
mental  instability  to  turn  to  religion  for 
help.  In  such  cases  it  is  very  necessary 
that  the  church  really  help.  Selfishness 
often  is  the  deep  root  of  mental  disorder 
and  day-dreaming  its  fruit.  Men  and 
women  who  have  neither  the  courage  nor 
the  unselfishness  to  face  a  hard  situation 
turn  to  religion  as  an  opportunity  for  the 
indulging  of  a  pernicious  kind  of  day- 
dreaming. Christianity  has  proven  its 
moral  supremacy  in  its  refusal  to  cater  to 
this  peculiar  kind  of  selfishness.  The  spirit 
of  the  church  becomes  unwholesome  when 
encouragement  is  given,  consciously  or  un- 
consciously, to  this  bad  habit  which  satis- 
fies the  desires  of  a  person  by  the  creations 
of  fancy.  On  the  other  hand,  in  so  far  as 
the  church  insists  upon  ideals  being  carried 
to  practice  it  decreases  the  danger  that  day- 
dreaming will  become  a  community  problem. 


92       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

The  first  steps  toward  mind  unwhole- 
someness  are  sometimes  taken  in  the  effort 
to  retreat  from  a  hard  personal  ordeal. 
The  individual  turns  his  back  upon  reality 
because  of  lack  of  courage.  The  church 
often  saves  one  from  this  danger  by  giving 
him  a  sense  of  the  resources  upon  which  he 
can  call  for  help.  The  religious  experience 
of  the  person  becomes  a  source  of  confi- 
dence, and  the  tendency  to  give  up  the 
struggle  by  being  satisfied  with  dreams  of 
victory  comes  to  an  end.  The  personality 
is  saved  from  moral  ruin,  perhaps  from 
mental  disorder. 

The  church  may  perform  the  same  ser- 
vice for  those  who  suffer  from  morbid  fears. 
Fear  is  the  enemy  of  mental  health.  Fear 
often  originates  as  a  result  of  moral  dis- 
order. Many  times  it  starts  in  experiences 
in  childhood  that  are  not  wisely  treated  by 
parents  or  that  are  concealed  from  parents. 
The  wiser  the  parent,  the  less  the  danger  of 
such  an  experience  troubling  the  child. 
Wrong  methods  of  moral  teaching  in  the 
church,  especially  in  the  Sunday  school, 


MENTAL  HEALTH  93 

occasionally  false  teaching,  are  causes  of 
morbid  fears.  It  is  usually  true  that  these 
fears  disappear  when  they  are  faced  and 
become  harmful  only  when  the  person  at- 
tempts to  run  away  from  them. 

In  so  far  as  the  church  teaches  a  positive 
morality  that  leads  men  and  women,  boys 
and  girls,  to  fight  their  moral  battles,  it 
decreases  the  tendency  toward  morbid 
fears.  It  is  a  surprise  at  first  to  the  student 
of  the  problem  how  often  a  morbid  fear 
expresses  itself  in  anti-social  or  immoral 
conduct. 

Nothing  conserves  the  mind  so  much  as 
having  a  healthy  interest  in  life.  It  is  a 
splendid  protection  against  both  morbid 
feeling  and  morbid  thinking.  It  keeps  one 
from  wishing  to  enjoy  the  poisonous  pleas- 
ures of  day-dreaming.  It  leads  to  whole- 
some activity.  It  invigorates  the  life  and 
takes  one's  thought  off  one's  self  by  oc- 
cupying the  attention  with  captivating 
purposes.  This  fact  the  church  cannot 
safely  forget.  The  barren  individual  life 
needs  the  same  treatment  that  the  barren 


94       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

social  life  requires.  A  more  interesting 
community  life  often  saves  people  from 
losing  their  personal  interest  in  normal  ac- 
tivity. The  life  of  the  small  community 
must  be  made  vital  in  order  to  be  whole- 
some. The  individual  who  finds  little  in 
Hfe  to  hve  for,  who  faces  an  uninviting 
situation,  must  be  led  to  a  deeper  under- 
standing of  the  meaning  of  human  ex- 
perience. 

In  so  far  as  the  church  lifts  the  moral 
standard  of  a  community  and  decreases 
vice,  it  ministers  to  the  mental  well-being 
of  the  people.  Immorality  is  very  closely 
connected  with  mind  disorder.  The  dis- 
solute life  often  expresses  itself  in  insanity. 
This  fact  especially  appears  in  the  study  of 
paresis,  a  brain  disease  which  generally  or- 
iginates from  syphilitic  infection.  Alcohol- 
ism also  is  a  cause  of  insanity.  Drug  habits 
lead  to  mental  disorders.  It  is  difficult  to 
have  a  sound  mind  in  a  sound  body  unless 
the  basis  of  both  is  made  a  sound  morality. 
Self-control  and  high  ideals  may  not  always 
prevent  insanity,  but  without  doubt  they 


MENTAL  HEALTH  95 

are  protective  in  their  tendency  and  prob- 
ably in  many  cases  guard  the  Hfe  with  a 
somewhat  neurotic  heredity  from  serious 
mental  diflSculty. 


IX 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  PROB- 
LEM  OF  THE  FEEBLE-MINDED 

A  recent  visit  to  a  country  school  to  give 
advice  concerning  two  children  who  were 
charged  with  immoral  conduct  and  who 
proved  to  be  mentally  defective  emphasized 
anew  the  problem  of  moral  segregation  in 
the  country  community.  City  moral  prob- 
lems, without  doubt,  because  of  their  mas- 
sive characteristics  are  usually  spectacular 
and  easily  attract  the  attention  of  students 
of  social  life.  Moral  problems  in  the  coun- 
try are  more  likely  to  be  underestimated 
because  they  usually  appear  as  isolated  and 
individual,  without  the  magnitude  that 
challenges  investigation.  Perhaps  a  just 
comparison  between  the  moral  dangers  of 
urban  life  and  those  of  rural  life  is  both  im- 
possible and  unprofitable,  but  it  is  clear 
that  the  forms  which  moral  problems  take 
must  differ  somewhat  in  the  two  types  of 
96 


PROBLEM  OF  FEEBLE-MINDED        97 

community  life.  The  city  parent  has  one 
advantage  in  meeting  moral  diflSculties 
which  seems  of  no  small  value  to  the 
thoughtful  country  father  and  mother. 
Urban  conditions  permit  the  more  careful 
parents  to  segregate  their  children,  at  least 
to  some  degree,  from  immoral  suggestions. 
If  vice  in  the  city  is  more  organized  and  ex- 
ploited, it  is  also  true  that  it  need  not 
touch  so  closely  the  life  of  the  child  as  it 
must  when  it  appears  in  the  country.  In 
the  country,  vice  may  be  said  to  be  more 
spontaneous  and  more  personal,  and  for 
these  reasons  all  the  more  dangerous  to  the 
naturally  innocent.  The  vicious  boy  may 
be  the  only  near  playmate  of  the  pure- 
minded  girl.  Their  association  in  the  same 
small  class  in  school  may  make  it  the  most 
natural  thing  in  the  world  that  they  should 
walk  home  together  after  school. 

Even  if  the  parents  realize  the  moral 
dangers  of  this  comradeship,  it  is  hard  to 
meet  the  problem.  Any  attempt  to  segre- 
gate the  child  from  the  evil  association  in- 
volves the  possibility  of  neighborhood  un- 


98       COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

friendliness  and  misunderstanding,  from 
which  one  naturally  shrinks.  The  parents 
who  have  the  courage  to  meet  the  problem 
without  regard  to  neighborhood  gossip  and 
hostility  often  find  that  the  attempted  seg- 
regation is  both  diflScult  to  maintain  and 
dangerous  in  itself.  The  child  is  almost 
certain  to  become  conscious  of  the  situa- 
tion, which  results  in  an  imwholesome  con- 
dition, and  the  vicious  influence  is  generally 
militant  in  its  effort  to  break  through  the 
barriers.  It  is,  of  course,  by  no  means  im- 
possible to  meet  the  situation  with  success, 
but  seldom  easy.  The  urban  mother  may 
segregate  her  child  without  depriving  it  of 
companionship  and  without  attracting  pub- 
licity. Indeed,  careful  urban  parents  take 
for  granted  the  necessity  of  a  limited  segre- 
gation of  their  children  from  the  well- 
recognized  moral  dangers  in  the  com- 
munity. In  neither  city  nor  country  is  the 
effort  to  protect  the  child  certain  of  suc- 
cess, but  in  the  country  it  is  more  diflScult. 
The  clearest  illustration  of  the  impor- 
tance of  this  problem  of  moral  segregation 


PROBLEM  OF  FEEBLE-MINDED         99 

in  the  country  appears  in  the  case  of  the 
defectives.  Science  teaches  the  very  grave 
danger  in  any  community  life  of  children 
who  are  morally  defective  or  who  are  mor- 
ally weak  because  they  are  mentally  de- 
ficient. 

Dangerous  as  is  the  ament,  or  mental 
defective,  anywhere,  he  is  doubly  so  in  the 
country,  because  he  is  less  likely  to  be  rec- 
ognized there  than  in  the  city,  and  he  has 
greater  opportunity  to  corrupt  the  normal 
because  he  is  not  seen  in  his  true  character. 
If  the  mentally  deficient  girl  often  becomes 
a  prostitute  in  the  city,  we  must  not  fail 
to  see  that  her  country  sister  is  likely  to 
poison  the  morals  of  an  entire  neighbor- 
hood and  finally  to  become  the  mother  of 
illegitimate  children.  The  city  usually  es- 
capes the  tainted  offspring,  because  of  the 
sterilizing  effects  of  the  prostitute's  dis- 
eases. 

Country  workers  need  to  realize  the  diffi- 
culties of  moral  segregation  in  the  small 
communities.  Some  parents  admit  that 
they  have  moved  to  town  to  escape  the 


100     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

corrupting  influence  of  bad  children  be- 
longing to  a  neighboring  family.  A  great 
relief  would  come  were  it  possible,  at  least, 
to  discover  the  defectives  early  and  remove 
them  from  the  community.  Science  is 
waiting  for  the  opportunity  to  protect  so- 
ciety from  the  moral  imbecile  and  the 
feeble-minded  both  in  country  and  city, 
but  little  progress  can  be  made  until  the 
public  is  educated  to  see  the  need  of  such 
protection.  Education  is  required  before 
the  extent  and  the  character  of  the  prob- 
lem of  the  morally  and  mentally  defective 
child  in  the  country  will  be  appreciated. 
It  is  important  for  the  social  worker  in 
rural  communities  to  think  of  the  waste 
of  moral  forces  caused  by  the  effort  to 
undo  the  evil  started  by  the  moral  imbecile, 
by  the  hopeless  effort  to  reform  him.  Rural 
moral  forces  are  too  precious  to  be  spent 
for  almost  useless  purposes,  when  greater 
knowledge  would  show  the  worker  how  to 
meet  the  situation  more  constructively.  In 
most  cases  it  is  for  the  welfare  of  both 
society  and  the  defective  child  himself  that 


PROBLEM  OF  FEEBLE-MINDED       101 

he  be  removed  from  association  with  nor- 
mal children.  The  significance  of  this  fact 
will  not  be  appreciated  in  the  country,  un- 
less all  who  influence  rural  public  opinion 
discover  its  importance  from  personal  ob- 
servation and  bring  it  to  the  attention  of 
the  more  thoughtful  parents.  And  now  is 
the  opportune  time. 

It  would  seem  also  as  if  the  city  must 
have  some  advantage  over  the  country  in 
the  attempt  to  control  amentia  because  of 
its  greater  effort  to  find  the  feeble-minded 
children  of  high  grade  by  means  of  tests, 
clinic  work,  and  the  keener  attention  of 
teachers  and  officials  to  the  retarded  chil- 
dren. Without  doubt  in  the  cities  the 
courts  and  the  police  also  help  to  discover 
defective  children  of  high  grade,  because  in 
the  cities  it  is  so  easy  for  such  children  to 
get  in  trouble  in  a  way  that  brings  them 
public  attention. 

It  is  reasonable  to  assume  that  the 
greater  competition  in  the  cities  tends  to 
reveal  mental  deficiency  that  would  be 
passed  by  without  notice  in  the  conditions 


102     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

of  country  life.  In  the  country  another 
difficulty  is  created  by  the  unwillingness 
often  of  teachers  and  neighbors  to  give  in- 
formation or  to  take  the  responsibility  of 
making  public  charges  respecting  defective 
children,  because  in  a  small  community 
everything  in  the  way  of  criticism  or  com- 
plaint is  so  personal  in  character  and  is  so 
likely  to  involve  many  persons,  on  account 
of  the  close  relationships  in  the  group, 
due  to  the  marrying  back  and  forth.  Yet 
the  ament  in  a  rural  school  has  the  best 
opportunity  to  poison  morally  the  children 
of  an  entire  neighborhood,  and  this  fact 
sometimes  explains  the  immoral  situation 
which  the  rural  educator  and  field  worker 
finds. 

The  greatest  problem  of  all  in  regard  to 
the  rural  ament  is  the  added  menace  such 
degeneration  threatens  because  of  the  re- 
sults of  rural  migration.  No  greater  coun- 
try problem  exists  than  the  condition  that 
has  been  so  well  stated  by  Davenport: 
^"Likewise  in  the  rural  and  the  semi-rural 

^Heredity  in  Relation  to  Eugenics,  211-212. 


PROBLEM  OF  FEEBLE-MINDED       103 

population  within  a  hundred  miles  of  our 
great  cities  we  find  a  disproportion  of  the 
indolent,  the  alcoholic,  the  feeble-minded, 
the  ne'er-do-well.  I  know  intimately  sev- 
eral such  localities  and  have  seen  in  one 
family  after  another  how  the  ambitious 
youth  leave  the  parental  roof-tree  to  try 
their  fortunes  in  the  city  while  the  weakest 
young  men  stay  behind,  supported  by  their 
parents,  or  earning  only  enough  to  buy  the 
liquor  their  defective  natures  crave,  and  are 
finally  forced  to  marry  a  weak  girl  and 
father  her  imbecile  offspring.  Such  vil- 
lages, depleted  of  the  best,  tend  to  become 
cradles  of  degeneracy  and  crime." 

Society  will  surely  be  hampered  in  its 
progress  unless  the  state  adopts  a  policy 
which  will  not  leave  the  ament  to  the 
indifference  and  misconception  of  the  small 
community.  We  need  not  only  the  city 
psychological  clinic;  we  need  also  the  state 
clinic.  The  state  department  of  public 
education  should  be  prepared  to  hunt  out 
the  defective,  and  the  state  needs  to  be 
able  to  provide  rational  treatment  for  all 


104     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

defectives  found.  Such  work  must  be  car- 
ried on  largely  through  the  schools.  Pro- 
fessor Pyle,  in  the  Psychological  Clinic  for 
February,  1913,  has  drawn  up  a  very  in- 
teresting suggestion  for  the  organization  of 
rural  clinic  work  by  means  of  a  state-wide 
examination  of  school  children.  No  other 
policy  promises  to  meet  this  problem.  It 
may  seem  costly,  but  only  to  those  who  do 
not  realize  the  burden  of  the  feeble-minded 
who  are  without  proper  supervision. 

The  rural  ament  will  never  receive  de- 
served attention  unless  social  workers  are 
alive  to  the  greatness  of  his  needs.  At  this 
point  those  who  realize  the  significance  of 
the  defective  child  must  concentrate  educa- 
tional effort.  The  demand  for  the  state- 
wide clinic  work  along  both  physical  and 
mental  lines  must  come  from  the  social 
workers,  teachers,  and  school  ojfficials  before 
the  legislators  can  be  expected  to  consider 
the  matter  seriously.  The  educating  of 
schoolmen  and  schoolwomen  in  regard  to 
the  imperative  character  of  this  special 
problem  is  no  hopeless  undertaking.     Al- 


PROBLEM  OF  FEEBLE-MINDED       105 

ready  a  limited  attention  to  such  educating 
effort  has  accomplished  wonders. 

From  every  side  of  the  problem  of  amen- 
tia, science  is  showing  that  society  cannot 
afford  to  ignore  the  feeble-minded.  In  so 
serious  a  matter  the  state  must  take  a 
larger  responsibility.  The  cost  in  social 
evils  and  in  dollars  of  such  cases  as  this 
reported  by  Dr.  Fernald^  is  too  great  for 
the  public  to  leave  the  small  communities 
to  meet  the  problem  of  amentia  as  best 
they  can.  ''A  feeble-minded  girl  of  the 
higher  grade  was  accepted  as  a  pupil  at 
the  Massachusetts  School  for  the  Feeble- 
minded when  she  was  fifteen  years  of  age. 
At  the  last  moment  the  mother  refused  to 
send  her  to  the  school,  as  she  'could  not 
bear  the  disgrace  of  publicly  admitting  that 
she  had  a  feeble-minded  child.'  Ten  years 
later  the  girl  was  committed  to  the  institu- 
tion by  the  court,  after  she  had  given  birth 
to  six  illegitimate  children,  four  of  whom 
were  still  living  and  all  feeble-minded.  The 

*  "History  of  the  Treatment  of  the  Feeble-minded," 

p.  n. 


106     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

city  where  she  Hved  had  supported  her  at 
the  almshouse  for  a  period  of  several 
months  at  each  confinement,  and  had  been 
compelled  to  assume  the  burden  of  the  life- 
long support  of  her  progeny,  and  finally 
decided  to  place  her  in  permanent  custody. 
Her  mother  had  died  broken-hearted  sev- 
eral years  previously." 

A  very  aggressive  attack  upon  the  prob- 
lem of  amentia  in  the  country  is  certain  to 
provide  unexpected  social  relief  along  other 
lines.  It  is  impossible  to  know  how  much 
the  problem  of  the  use  of  alcoholic  drinks 
in  the  country  is  related  to  the  problem  of 
feeble=mindedness.  When  one  has  seen  how 
strong  the  craving  for  intoxicants  is  among 
some  country  people,  without  the  sugges- 
tions and  constant  temptations  provided  by 
the  saloon  industry  in  the  cities,  it  is  clear 
that  much  may  be  expected  of  any  success- 
ful attack  upon  rural  amentia  in  decreasing 
alcoholism.  The  problem  of  illegitimacy  in 
the  country  is  certainly  in  large  measure  a 
problem  related  to  feeble-mindedness.  The 
moral  imbecile  and  the  feeble-minded  boy 


PROBLEM  OF  FEEBLE-MINDED       107 

given  to  occasional  fire-setting  are  a  most 
serious  menace. 

When  this  problem  of  rural  amentia  is 
more  successfully  met,  a  great  economic 
gain  also  must  result.  The  best  propa- 
ganda carried  on  by  experiment  stations 
and  agricultural  colleges  must  fail  in  com- 
munities where  a  feeble-minded  strain  by 
close  intermarriage  has  made  nearly  an  en- 
tire community  defective  or  abnormal,  or 
has  been  a  large  cause  of  the  constant  loss 
of  the  ambitious  youth,  because  of  their 
eagerness  to  remove  from  such  an  unfavor- 
able social  environment  to  a  city  having 
promise  of  better  conditions.  Progress  in 
the  control  of  rural  amentia  must  surely 
conserve  the  resources  of  the  various  ac- 
tivities that  are  attempting  to  improve  so- 
cial conditions  in  the  country.  Political 
exploitation  also,  in  its  different  forms  in 
rural  communities,  is  tied  up  with  amentia. 
The  largest  result,  perhaps,  of  all  which 
may  be  expected  to  follow  an  effective 
program  respecting  the  country  feeble- 
minded is  the  bringing  of  optimism  into 


108     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

the  lives  of  people  in  some  country  places 
who  at  present  are  possessed  by  a  pes- 
simism which  forms  the  largest  obstacle  to 
social  and  economic  progress. 

The  church  of  the  small  community  in 
its  effort  to  conserve  country  life  must 
take  to  heart  this  fact  of  the  danger  of  the 
anient  in  the  country.  Nothing  will  so 
certainly  discourage  the  substantial  stock 
in  the  country  and  so  stimulate  its  move- 
ment to  the  cities  as  to  permit  the  ament 
to  thrive  and  enjoy  freedom  in  the  coun- 
tr}^  environment.  The  whole  problem  needs 
to  be  taken  in  hand  by  the  forces  of  the 
state  as  a  matter  of  efficient  administration. 
Science  has  already  furnished  the  informa- 
tion which  justifies  another  step  in  the  con- 
trol of  amentia.  The  country  needs  the 
advantages  of  this  new  progress  no  less 
than  the  cities,  as  every  student  of  rural 
moral  problems  must  recognize.  Like  all 
such  matters,  it  is  mostly  a  problem  in  edu- 
cating people  in  the  country. 


X 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OF  BEAUTY 

Opportunities  to  realize  beauty  are 
among  the  great  advantages  of  life  in  the 
country.  The  church  of  the  small  com- 
munity may  assume  a  most  beneficent  so- 
cial ministration  by  interpreting  these  op- 
portunities to  its  people.  Life  sours  and 
grows  barren  when  the  sense  of  beauty 
fades  out  of  human  experience.  It  is  in- 
deed often  true  of  the  vision  of  nature's 
beauty — 

"At  length  the  Man  perceives  it  die  away. 
And  fade  into  the  light  of  common  day." 

Nothing  in  life  fully  compensates  for  so 
great  a  loss.  It  is  as  if  through  beauty  we 
penetrated  deepest  into  the  eternal  life  in 
which  "we  live,  and  move,  and  have  our 
being,"  and  drew  into  our  own  Httle  worlds 
the  strength  that  nourishes  all  things. 
What  Ruskin  has  said  about  the  sky  is 

109 


110     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

also  true  of  all  the  glories  of  nature. 
''Bright  as  it  is,  it  is  not  *too  bright,  or 
good  for  human  nature's  daily  food';  it  is 
fitted  in  all  its  functions  for  the  perpetual 
comfort  and  exalting  of  the  heart,  for 
soothing  and  purifying  it  from  its  dross 
and  dust.  Sometimes  gentle,  sometimes 
capricious,  sometimes  awful,  never  the 
same  for  two  moments  together;  almost 
human  in  its  passions,  almost  spiritual  in 
its  tenderness,  almost  divine  in  its  infinity, 
its  appeal  to  what  is  immortal  in  us  is  as 
distinct  as  its  ministry  of  chastisement  or 
of  blessing  to  what  is  mortal  is  essential." 
He  who  lives  in  the  open  country  may 
have  fellowship  with  the  very  spirit  of 
beauty.  His  daily  work  brings  him  con- 
stantly into  the  presence  of  scenes  such  as 
the  artist  delights  to  reproduce  and  make 
immortal.  If  only  he  has  eyes  to  see  he  can 
enrich  his  soul  with  wealth  that  becomes 
an  increasing  joy.    His  opportunity  it  is 

"To  see  the  world  in  a  grain  of  sand. 
And  a  heaven  in  a  wild  flower; 
Hold  infinity  in  the  palm  of  your  hand 
And  eternity  in  an  hour," 


CONSERVATION  OF  BEAUTY        111 

It  must  be  admitted,  however,  that  many 
in  the  country  live  as  John  Calvin  is  said  to 
have  done  in  the  presence  of  the  Alpine 
wonders — indifferent  to  the  great  oppor- 
tunity. The  church  must  accept  some  re- 
sponsibility for  this.  It  is  open  to  question 
whether  the  church  can  minister  religiously, 
even  in  the  most  narrow  sense,  while  un- 
concerned about  the  beauties  of  life  that 
breathe  the  very  presence  of  God.  Heli- 
gion  must  draw  a  part  of  its  vitality  from 
such  experiences  as  Wordsworth's: 

"And  I  have  felt 
A  presence  that  disturbs  me  with  the  joy 
Of  elevated  thoughts;  a  sense  sublime 
Of  something  far  more  deeply  interfused, 
Whose  dwelling  is  the  light  of  setting  suns, 
And  the  round  ocean  and  the  living  air. 
And  the  blue  sky,  and  in  the  mind  of  man; 
A  motion  and  a  spirit,  that  impels 
All  thinking  things,  all  objects  of  all  thought 
And  rolls  through  all  things." 

It  was  recently  said  that  the  reason  for 
the  low  prices  of  beautifully-bound  second- 
hand copies  of  standard  English  poets  on 
sale  in  a  Canadian  city  was  the  fact  that 
the  present  generation  was  coming  into  the 


112     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

possession  of  books,  for  which  they  did  not 
care,  that  had  been  brought  from  England 
by  their  parents.  If  this  is  true  of  any 
country  district,  it  requires  no  prophet  to 
foresee  an  increasing  city-drift  from  that 
territory.  The  country  cannot  content  one 
as  a  mere  place  for  the  making  of  a  living. 
He  who  has  no  larger  motive  is  likely  to 
live  in  the  country  as  a  man  in  exile,  long- 
ing for  the  pleasures  which  the  country 
gives  sparingly,  and  failing  to  appreciate 
the  qualitative  joys  which  the  country  is 
wiUing  to  lavish.  White's  "Natural  His- 
tory and  Antiquities  of  Selborne,"  which 
has  already  been  published  in  more  than 
eighty  editions,  gives  splendid  testimony 
concerning  the  pleasures  possible  in  the 
country  to  the  nature-lover  who  has  the 
ability  to  make  large  use  of  his  environ- 
ment. 

It  becomes  the  duty  of  the  church  in  the 
small  community  to  conserve  the  apprecia- 
tion of  the  beauties  of  nature.  Many 
churches  in  the  country  appear  largely  to 
neglect  this  splendid  ministration.      AVith- 


CONSERVATION  OF  BEAUTY         113 

out  doubt  this  neglect  reacts  upon  the 
church  and  weakens  its  social  service.  In- 
deed, because  of  its  necessary  influence, 
the  country  church  that  fails  seriously  to 
conserve  the  love  of  the  beautiful  in  every 
way  possible  creates  a  peril.  The  discovery 
of  the  passing  beauties  of  flowers,  trees, 
harvests,  outstretching  landscapes,  is  one 
of  the  great  compensations  of  rural  labor. 
When  these  discoveries  are  not  realized, 
and  all  things  become  commonplace,  the 
open  country  is  made  monotonous  and  is 
brutalized. 

No  country  church,  therefore,  rightly  can 
fail  to  assume  the  role  of  interpreter  of 
natural  beauty.  The  church  should  honor 
its  own  building  and  yard.  The  meeting 
place  ought  itself  to  be  a  thing  of  beauty. 
Rarely  is  this  impossible.  Intelligent  in- 
terest and  honest  concern  will  nearly  al- 
ways change  the  barren,  even  ugly,  church 
building  sometimes  to  be  found  in  the 
country  into  a  dignified,  appealing  House 
of  God.  Church  papers  ought  to  give 
more  space  to  this  side  of  country  religious 


114     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

work.  The  faculties  of  state  colleges  ought 
more  often  to  be  called  upon  to  give  advice 
regarding  shrubbery,  trees,  and  lawns  for 
the  churchyard.  Where  there  is  a  library, 
the  church  people  should  see  that  some 
such  periodical  as  The  Craftsman  is  added 
to  influence  the  community.  The  appeal 
to  beauty  by  the  church  service  ought 
never  to  be  merely  a  by-product.  In  some 
form  such  as  sermons,  concerts,  lectures, 
exhibitions,  flower  shows,  a  definite  appeal 
may  be  made  every  year  that  will  greatly 
increase  the  appreciation  of  natural  beauty 
on  the  part  of  the  people  of  the  com- 
munity. 

The  church  should  also  consciously  labor 
to  develop  that  community  spirit  which  re- 
spects its  own  resources  of  beauty.  Such 
respect  flowers  in  many  social  virtues.  The 
inspiration  of  the  church  should  give  vital- 
ity to  a  popular  village  improvement  so- 
ciety. The  needs  of  the  church  and  the 
school-yard  should  be  given  constant  atten- 
tion. All  such  effort  lifts  the  standard  of 
life.  The  moral  protection  that  results  from 


CONSERVATION  OF  BEAUTY         115 

such  appreciation  of  beauty  can  hardly  be 
overstated.  The  appeal  which  is  made  by 
a  revelation  of  beauty  often  sinks  deeply 
into  youth,  and  remains  a  memory  that 
strengthens  character,  and  purifies.  The 
minister  in  the  country  may  well  think  of 
natural  beauty  as  one  of  his  assets.  Rus- 
kin's  "Modern  Painters"  can  bring  to 
many  a  country  pastor  the  change  of  mind 
that  Henry  Drummond  says  it  gave  him. 
Even  the  words  of  Jesus  have  a  deeper 
meaning  to  the  lover  of  the  country's 
beauty,  to  him  who  has  learned  that 
"sweet  is  the  lore  which  Nature  brings." 


XI 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OF  GOODNESS 

Social  life  draws  its  health  from  morality. 
It  is  goodness  which  provides  every  worthy 
thing  in  human  society  with  its  vitality. 
Morality  thus  makes  society  possible,  for, 
void  of  goodness,  human  association  would 
prove  itself  the  existence  that  Thomas 
Hobbs  pronounced  * 'solitary,  poor,  nasty, 
brutish,  and  short." 

The  moral  resources,  therefore,  of  any 
community  are  of  priceless  social  value.  It 
is  as  true  of  the  group  as  of  the  individual 
— the  claims  of  goodness  are  supreme. 
Man's  social  progress  is  conditioned  by  his 
moral  growth.  Any  attempt  to  conserve 
goodness  and  to  express  it  in  worthy  ac- 
tivities is  an  effort  which,  when  successful, 
means  the  lifting  of  the  level  of  human 
association  at  some  significant  point.    No 

116 


CONSERVATION  OF  GOODNESS       117 

real  social  problem  falls  short  of  social 
causes.  No  social  remedy  meets  the  final 
needs  of  the  occasion  unless  moral  reforma- 
tion is  included.  Morality  occupies  no  part 
of  life.  It  demands  the  right  to  permeate 
all  life.  It  follows,  therefore,  that  moral 
opportunities  may  be  found  in  ordinary 
circumstances,  and  that  moral  forces  need 
to  operate  in  the  common  experiences  of 
life.  Christianity  recognizes  this  to  the 
full.  It  proclaims  throughout  the  entire 
territory  of  life  a  universal  moral  worth. 
The  church  that  conserves  moral  values 
will  enter  into  the  commonplace  of  hfe  and 
dignify  it  with  the  prerogatives  of  moral 
consequence. 

No  institution  in  the  small  community 
has  so  great  a  responsibility  for  developing 
the  moral  forces  and  utilizing  them  for 
social  welfare  as  the  church.  The  city 
church  shares  this  responsibility  in  a 
greater  degree  with  other  organizations. 
The  country  church  is  in  possession  of  a 
large  part  of  the  moral  equipment  of  the 
community.     The  church  surely  fails  if  it 


118     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

conceives  its  function  as  merely  to  make 
use  of  the  moral  forces  of  the  community 
for  its  own  prosperity.  Of  course  the 
church  never  consciously  assumes  such  a 
position,  but  since  the  actual  attitude  of  the 
church  is  largely  determined  by  the  thought 
of  its  leading  members,  it  happens  that 
some  churches  really  do  regard  their  social 
mission  selfishly.  The  church  organization 
cannot  rightly  take  any  other  position  than 
that  of  an  instrument.  It  is  in  duty  bound 
to  lead  moral  strivings  into  profitable  social 
activities,  to  put  ideals  to  work,  to  bring 
moral  purposes  face  to  face  with  real  needs. 
The  church  discovers  moral  resources,  in- 
vigorates moral  purposes,  and  trains  moral 
energy  into  efficient  social  service.  In  con- 
serving the  moral  resources  of  the  small 
community  the  church  needs  to  emphasize 
moral  activities  rather  than  sentiments,  a 
positive  rather  than  a  negative  morality, 
moral  causes  rather  than  results. 

Religion  is  always  in  danger  of  being  ex- 
ploited by  persons  who  are  socially  patho- 
logical.   Even  normal  persons  easily  form 


CONSERVATION  OF  GOODNESS      119 

the  habit  of  conceiving  of  virtue  as  a  senti- 
ment rather  than  a  voHtion.  Morahty, 
true  to  its  instincts,  leads  to  activities.  Re- 
ligious work  in  some  small  places  is  made 
nearly  hopeless  by  the  irresponsible  talker 
who  expresses  fine  sentiments,  but  who  so 
acts  as  to  lose  the  respect  of  the  commu- 
nity. The  moral  burden  of  such  persons  is 
well  understood  by  every  experienced  reli- 
gious worker  in  the  country.  It  needs  to 
be  noticed,  however,  that  these  difficult 
people  are  at  times  the  logical  outcome  of 
the  attitude  that  the  church  itseK  has 
taken.  Professor  William  James,  in  his 
discussion  of  habit,  ha^  written  clearly  con- 
cerning the  danger  of  creating  ideals  that 
are  not  brought  to  a  discharge — in  other 
words,  of  producing  sentiments  without  re- 
gard to  action.  The  church  may  uncon- 
sciously give  the  impression  that  attending 
religious  services  is  a  virtue,  when  the  peo- 
ple need  to  be  taught  that  the  purpose  of 
all  such  gatherings  is  inspiration  for  ser- 
vice. The  teaching  of  the  church  may 
give  the  impression  that  the  instrument  is 


120     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

itself  the  end.  It  certainly  brings  ques- 
tions to  the  mind  of  the  social  worker  to 
find  in  a  small  community  the  greater 
part  of  the  moral  energy  of  the  church 
being  spent  in  supporting  many  religious 
services  that  lead  to  nothing  concrete, 
when  the  moral  conditions  in  the  town 
imperatively  demand  specific  efforts. 

The  country  churches,  as  social  workers 
often  know  by  sad  experience,  sometimes 
preach  a  negative  morality  rather  than  a 
positive  one.  An  atmosphere  of  repression 
is  produced  by  constant  emphasis  upon 
prohibitions.  Christianity  ought  surely  by 
this  time  to  be  free  from  the  interpolated 
asceticism  which  has  no  proper  place  in 
its  teachings.  Youth,  who  might  respond 
to  a  positive  appeal  to  do  concrete  whole- 
some service,  flee  the  church  that  considers 
that  its  ministration  has  to  do  mostly  with 
the  infliction  of  trivial  prohibitions.  Chris- 
tianity in  its  early  history  did  not  become 
a  militant  moral  force  by  emphasis  upon 
prohibitions.  The  country  church  that 
takes  its  work  seriously  will  kill  out  so- 


CONSERVATION  OF  GOODNESS       121 

cially  unwholesome  elements  by  substitu- 
tion. It  will  by  instinct  assume  a  positive 
attitude  toward  the  community  at  every 
point,  and  provide  opportunities  for  the 
doing  of  things  worth  while.  Such  a  pro- 
gram splendidly  conserves  the  moral  re- 
sources of  the  small  community. 

The  country  church  needs  above  all  else 
to  think  in  terms  of  moral  causes.  It  can- 
not conserve  the  moral  resources  of  the 
community  unless  it  functions  with  ref- 
erence to  the  causes  that  operate  morally. 
The  minister  must  interpret  significant 
scientific  information  that  makes  for  moral 
and  social  efficiency.  Parents  especially 
need  concrete  instruction  at  many  points 
that  a  morally  ambitious  organization,  such 
as  the  church,  should  give.  He  who  will 
take  the  trouble  to  uncover  the  moral  life 
of  some  of  the  youth  in  many  country 
places  will  appreciate  the  significance  of 
this.  Why  should  not  the  churches  get 
scientists  who  can  make  a  popular  appeal 
to  give  courses  from  time  to  time  upon 
matters  that  concern  the  moral  and  social 


122     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

interests  of  the  community?  Such  courses 
are  given  in  the  cities  by  organizations  that 
have  a  part  of  the  moral  and  social  purpose 
that  belongs  to  the  country  church.  When 
churches  create  a  demand  for  this  kind  of 
work,  workers  will  be  found  to  undertake 
it.  The  writer's  experience  recently  in  giv- 
ing a  week's  course  in  sociology  in  the 
church  of  a  community  in  New  Hampshire 
has  demonstrated  in  one  case  that  more 
people  appeared  to  respond  to  such  an 
undertaking  than  most  ministers  would 
have  supposed. 

The  most  powerful  moral  causes  are 
born  in  the  home.  The  church  that 
ministers  to  the  social  needs  of  the 
community  will  certainly  teach  constantly 
and  with  precision  the  solemn  duties  and 
magnificent  opportunities  of  parents.  The 
parents  must  be  taught  that  they  cannot 
with  success  farm  out  their  children  mor- 
ally by  making  use  of  organizations  such  as 
the  school  and  the  Sunday  school.  It  re- 
quires greater  skill  to  develop  moral  effi- 
ciency in  the  home  through  the  teaching  of 


CONSERVATION  OF  GOODNESS       123 

the  church  than  to  start  some  organization 
that  may  for  a  time  meet  the  problem 
created  by  the  failure  of  the  home.  The 
church,  however,  needs  to  think  of  its 
problem  in  terms  of  causes,  and  to  utilize 
its  moral  energy  in  making  wholesome  con- 
ditions at  those  points  where  character  is 
first  made.  The  temptation  to  attempt  to 
change  results  while  causes  are  allowed  to 
continue  is  always  present.  It  is  true,  how- 
ever, that  social  progress  comes  best  by 
attention  to  causes;  and,  by  its  teaching 
and  practice,  the  church  should  enforce 
this  truth  with  reference  to  the  practical, 
social  problems  of  the  community. 


XII 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OF  TRUTH 

Religion  conserves  the  highest  values  of 
life.  It  assures  trusting  men  and  women 
who  respond  to  the  appeal  of  the  spiritual 
that  their  deepest  cravings  are  trustworthy, 
and,  in  this  manner,  religion  protects  the 
sources  from  which  issues  the  wholesome- 
ness  of  human  society.  When  true  to  its 
instincts,  religion  adds  to  the  appreciation 
of  spiritual  values  an  energy  that  forces 
these  values  to  become  abiding  motives  of 
gracious,  persistent,  and  sacrificing  social 
service.  Assurance  of  the  credibility  of 
truth  men  and  women  deeply  crave.  Re- 
ligion, in  satisfying  this  human  craving  and 
thus  conserving  trust  in  truth,  creates  an 
unequaled  energy  for  labor  that  makes  for 
social  betterment. 

The  social  service  of  any  country  church 

124 


CONSERVATION  OF  TRUTH  125 

is  in  no  small  part  determined  by  its  atti- 
tude toward  truth.  Any  organization  of 
individuals  meets  the  same  temptations 
that  the  individuals  themselves  encounter. 
There  are  subtle  but  persuasive  influences 
that  operate  upon  a  church  in  such  manner 
as  to  make  the  organization  sometimes  un- 
consciously deficient  in  its  passion  for  truth. 
These  influences  are  more  captivating  in  the 
small  community  than  in  the  city  because 
of  the  closer  contact  of  persons.  This  con- 
dition of  disloyalty  to  the  finer  conception 
of  the  claims  of  truth  may  develop  even 
when  the  organization  is  most  zealous  in 
pressing  for  recognition  as  the  community 
teacher.  Outward  prosperity  does  not 
measure  inner  worth.  The  history  of  the 
Church  abounds  in  warnings  that  the 
spiritual  mission  of  any  body  of  religious 
persons  must  not  be  thought  of  in  an  easy- 
going, self-satisfied,  formal  manner.  A 
vital  passion  for  truth  precedes  a  vigorous 
social  activity.  This  explains  why  the  so- 
cial service  of  the  Church  is  so  largely  con- 
ditioned by  its  teaching  concerning  the  area 


126     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

of  truth  and  by  its  success  in  inspiring  re- 
gard for  truth. 

Any  small  community  suffers  when  it  is 
commonly  thought  that  religion  belongs  to 
a  part  of  life,  that  it  is  a  field  of  experience 
rather  than  an  attitude  that  enters  into  all 
experiences.  This  is  a  fundamental  mat- 
ter, for  no  religious  zeal  expresses  itself 
socially  in  reasonable  manner  when  life  is 
conceived  of  as  divided  into  sacred  and 
secular.  Even  those  most  satisfied  with 
such  a  conception  find  it  impossible  in 
concrete  cases  to  draw  the  line  of  separation 
between  the  two  parts  of  life;  and  the  most 
unscientific  observer  notices  in  individual 
cases  that  causes  in  one  field  cross  over  to 
produce  results  in  the  other.  The  Chris- 
tianity of  Jesus  suggests  at  every  point 
that  all  life  must  be  thought  of  as  sacred, 
except  such  elements  as  result  from  the 
sinful  desire  to  destroy  or  limit  this  sacred- 
ness.  The  church,  it  would  seem  then, 
must  take  spiritual  possession  of  the  entire 
territory  of  activity  in  a  community,  pro- 
claiming the  absolute  prerogative  of  truth 


CONSERVATION  OF  TRUTH  1^27 

in  every  concrete  social  interest.  The 
church  that  fails  at  this  point  can  at  best 
assume  merely  a  limited  social  service  and 
must  find  itself  without  all  of  its  resources 
for  successfully  carrying  on  its  limited  work. 
The  rural  community  especially  needs  to 
realize  the  permeation  of  truth  in  all  of  its 
life.  Farming  is  an  industry  that  must  be 
carried  on  in  a  field  where  great  natural 
forces  operate  without  the  usual  degree  of 
human  control,  and,  at  times,  not  accord- 
ing to  human  interests.  Agriculture  has  a 
hazardous  character,  expressed  in  such  con- 
crete difficulties  as  droughts,  frosts,  insect- 
pests,  and  over-stocked  markets.  The 
farmer,  more  than  most  men,  because  of 
personal  experiences,  may  come  to  think  of 
life  as  a  gambler's  chance,  and  of  success  as 
largely  an  accident.  This  fatalistic  tend- 
ency in  the  thinking  of  farmers  has  been 
noticed  by  writers,  just  as  tendencies  of 
thought  in  other  occupations  have  received 
attention.  The  great  danger,  however,  in 
this  tendency  of  rural  folk  is  the  decreased 
interest  in  knowledge  as  a  means  of  con- 


128     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

trol.  The  scientist  finds  in  his  failure  to 
control  natural  law  a  challenge  for  further 
investigation,  while  the  farmer's  experience 
often  contributes  to  the  upbuilding  of  a 
fatalistic  philosophy  of  life. 

Any  occupation  that  requires  a  constant 
struggle  with  natural  forces  tempts  one  to 
become  fatalistic.  The  sailor  and  physician 
meet  this  temptation  as  well  as  the  farmer, 
but  the  larger  number  involved  in  the  case 
of  the  farmer  makes  this  rural  temptation 
of  greater  social  significance.  If  enough 
individual  farmers  in  any  community  be- 
come fatalists,  the  spirit  of  the  entire 
community  is  colored  and  depressed.  The 
town  settles  down  to  accept  whatever 
comes,  and  even  degeneration  may  begin. 
It  is  interesting  to  notice  that,  although 
no  science  can  be  so  important  socially  as 
that  which  has  to  do  with  agriculture,  it 
has  been  one  of  the  slowest  to  develop. 
Fatalists  do  not  become  enthusiasts  for 
knowledge.  Who,  however,  can  doubt  the 
great  need  of  an  increase  of  knowledge  in 
most    rural    communities    regarding    the 


CONSERVATION  OF  TRUTH  129 

proper   methods  of  conducting  the  com- 
plex and  difficult  business  of  farming? 

The  church  should  accept  responsibility 
at  this  point.  It  must  set  itself  against  the 
current  and  insist  upon  its  members'  real- 
izing their  obligation  to  take  a  proper 
interest  in  those  matters  that  have  to  do 
with  individual  and  social  well-being. 
Some,  from  sheer  laziness,  turn  to  the 
spiritual  as  a  refuge  from  the  necessity  of 
facing  actual  situations  in  this  life  that 
demand  clear-headed  thinking.  The  church 
should  teach  a  philosophy  of  conduct  that 
is  born  of  the  belief  in  a  well-ordered  and 
morally  rewarding  universe.  It  may  wisely 
assume  a  distinction  between  spiritual  truth 
and  human  knowledge,  but  it  ought  not  to 
encourage  the  idea  of  a  separation  between 
the  two.  The  farmer  must  be  saved  so- 
cially by  his  finding  himself  within  a  sacred, 
truth-permeated  world  as  he  plows,  plants, 
and  reaps.  He  must  value  knowledge  as 
the  human  construction  of  a  part  of  the 
truth  of  God,  born  of  a  divinely  given  in- 
stinct, and  realize  that  by  despising  the 


130     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

handiwork  of  conscientious  men  he  does  no 
honor  to  the  greater  eternal  truth.  The 
prosperity  of  the  rural  community  is  de- 
termined largely  by  knowledge  and  effi- 
ciency, by  mental  vigor  and  physical  skill. 
Science  is  never  more  needed  than  in  the 
work  of  the  farmer.  The  church  needs  to 
appreciate  this,  and  then  to  discover  that 
its  own  prosperity  is  related  to  the  pros- 
perity of  the  community  it  serves.  The 
unprosperous  farmer  must  either  lower  his 
standard  of  life  or  change  his  business, 
which  usually  means  removal  from  the 
community.  This  lowering  of  the  standard 
of  life  means  a  decrease  in  the  possible  con- 
tribution of  one  person  to  the  social  minis- 
tration of  the  church — perhaps  the  creation 
of  a  social  problem.  If  the  discouraged 
farmer  or  his  sons  go  city- ward,  there  is 
likely  to  be  a  loss  to  the  community  that 
would  not  have  happened  had  the  church 
been  able  to  help  the  farmer  meet  his 
problem  successfully.  The  church  cannot 
become  socially  efficient  and  neglect  its  in- 
dividual resources. 


CONSERVATION  OF  TRUTH  131 

The  church  that  holds  up  to  its  members 
the  conception  of  an  unbroken  world  of 
truth,  sacred  at  every  point  and  God- 
created,  needs  to  finish  a  good  work  well 
begun.  It  ought  to  assume  in  the  small 
community  the  largest  obligations  for  in- 
spiring regard  for  knowledge  and  reverence 
for  truth.  This  really  means  that  the 
church  in  its  teaching  must  keep  near  to 
the  actual,  immediate,  and  everyday  needs 
of  its  members.  Of  course  this  is  largely  a 
question  of  the  attitude  of  the  pastor,  and 
his  attitude  is  often  decided  by  his  train- 
ing and  instinctive  sympathy.  One  who 
watches  a  church  in  a  small  community  at 
work  can  hardly  fail  often  to  observe  that 
little  results  socially  because  little  effort  is 
definite  and  related  to  concrete  social 
needs.  When  a  church  shows  regard  for 
such  truth  as  is  pertinent  to  definite,  social 
conditions,  social  progress  is  certain.  The 
historj^  of  Christianity  is  suggestive  as  to 
the  possibilities  of  such  definite  social  effort 
on  the  part  of  the  church. 

The  church  that  ministers  to  the  life  of 


132     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

the  community  will  have  a  large  conception 
of  its  educational  work.  The  minister  may 
not  teach  agriculture,  but  it  appears  fair  to 
ask  that  he  inspire  his  followers  with  such 
a  regard  for  knowledge  and  truth  that  it 
will  assure  the  success  of  any  agricultural 
club  or  similar  enterprise  that  may  be 
wisely  started.  The  minister,  also,  if  his 
church  is  to  be  socially  efficient  in  its  rela- 
tion to  the  community  life,  must  build  up 
the  conception  that  social,  moral,  and 
spiritual  conditions  are  related  to  causes 
and  that  reforms  must  also  operate  by 
means  of  causes.  There  are  conditions  that 
a  community  cannot  tolerate  because  they 
are  producers  of  contagious  evils.  Such 
evils,  perhaps,  can  be  removed  only  by  the 
substitution  of  new  circumstances  that  will 
bring  forth  benevolent,  character-building 
causes.  The  saloon  may  remain  until  a 
recreation  club  is  successfully  organized. 
The  community  often  tolerates  great  evils 
because  so  many  persons  are  not  taught 
successfully  that  what  a  community  sows 
that  must  it  also  reap.    It  is  doubtless  un- 


CONSERVATION  OF  TRUTH  133 

fortunate  that  ministers  usually  have  stud- 
ied philosophy  so  much  and  science  so 
little.  It  is  not  always  the  instinct  of  the 
minister  to  think  of  causes  in  the  realm  of 
social  and  moral  experiences.  Science  has 
a  tendency  to  make  one  look  always  for 
causes  and  this  tends  to  conserve  effort. 

The  church  can  be  inspired  to  a  realiza- 
tion of  the  social  significance  of  truth  by 
self-examination  at  times.  It  may  be  a 
revelation  to  the  socially  inefficient  church 
to  trace  out  in  detail  without  prejudice  its 
effective  social  influence,  but  it  comes  to  a 
better  social  self  by  an  honest  survey  of  its 
work.  In  cases  not  a  few  such  an  investi- 
gation leads  to  one  rational  conclusion — 
the  church  can  help  conserve  the  moral  re- 
sources of  the  community  only  by  losing 
its  individual  life  by  uniting  with  another 
organization.  Moral  resources  are  too  sa- 
cred to  be  used  in  keeping  alive  two 
churches  where  social  welfare  calls  for  one 
effective  community  church. 


XIII 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  SMALL 
COMMUNITY  AND  THE  CON- 
SERVATION OF  HUMAN  EX- 
PERIENCES 

The  social  resource  which  has  most  sig- 
nificance for  the  future  of  any  community 
is  the  potential  character  of  its  people. 
The  church  of  the  small  community  is 
therefore  supremely  tested  by  its  efficiency 
in  conserving  the  moral  capacity  of  the 
people  to  whom  it  ministers.  No  social 
service  of  a  community  church  can  prop- 
erly be  an  end  in  itself.  The  church  must 
have  a  social  vision  and  a  community  pro- 
gram because  moral  character  is  greatly 
influenced  for  good  or  evil  by  social  con- 
ditions. Interest  in  the  means  of  social 
advance  must  not  dull,  however,  in  the 
consciousness  of  the  church  the  ultimate 
purpose  of  all  it  does.  It  serves  socially 
that  it  may  minister  morally. 

The   church   of   the   small    community 

134 


HUMAN  EXPERIENCES  135 

should  conserve  morally  to  the  largest  pos- 
sible degree  the  significant  experiences  that 
deeply  operate  upon  the  character  of  men 
and  women.  These  tremendous  events  of 
life,  charged  with  potential  good  or  evil, 
stand  out  clearly  in  the  rural  or  village 
community.  Human  joys,  sorrows,  strug- 
gles, and  tragedies  are  not  so  largely  hidden 
from  the  community  as  they  are  in  the 
great  urban  centers.  People  do  know  what 
is  happening  to  their  neighbors,  and  they 
care  also  when  they  have  moral  sympathy. 
The  lasting  influence  of  these  momentous 
experiences  of  life  is  to  no  small  degree 
decided  by  the  sense  the  individual  has  of 
the  sympathy,  understanding,  indifference, 
or  malice  of  his  community  associates.  Lit- 
tle can  happen  in  the  small  community 
that  does  not  excite  social  interest.  No 
one  is  more  conscious  of  this  fact  than  he 
who  is  called  upon  to  assume  with  self- 
control  an  experience  of  great  joy  or  en- 
dure with  courage  an  overwhelming  sorrow. 
Men  and  women  often  pass  through  these 
experiences  and  are  forever  after  different 


136     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

from  what  they  were.  It  is  the  business  of 
the  church  of  the  small  community  to  pro- 
tect people  from  danger  as  they  pass 
through  these  testing  ordeals.  That  this 
may  be  done  it  is  necessary  that  the 
church  create  in  the  community  the  whole- 
some social  attitude  which  comes  from 
moral  sympathy.  The  church  can  do  this 
service  by  becoming  the  skilful  interpreter 
of  the  profound  meaning  of  the  crises  of 
life.  Narrow  attitudes  of  thinking  and  feel- 
ing must  be  driven  out  of  the  minds  and 
hearts  of  people  by  a  deep  sense  of  human 
need  and  brotherhood.  To  believe  this  im- 
possible is  to  doubt  the  practical  eflSciency 
of  the  teaching  of  Jesus. 

The  people  of  the  small  community  often 
have  an  attitude  of  morbid  curiosity  re- 
garding the  critical  experiences  that  indi- 
viduals have  to  face.  The  moral  danger  of 
this  both  for  the  individual  who  meets  the 
crisis  and  for  those  who  watch  him  with  un- 
wholesome interest  is  very  great.  To  pre- 
vent this  moral  injury  on  these  occasions 
when  character  is  supremely  tested,  the  con- 


HUMAN  EXPERIENCES  137 

structive  influence  of  a  church  ought  always 
to  be  felt,  and  morbid  curiosity  pushed 
aside.  Of  course  this  is  to  expect  much  of 
the  church,  as  anyone  who  knows  the  weak- 
nesses of  the  small  community  will  admit, 
but  surely  it  is  not  unreasonable  to  ask 
Christian  people  to  express  their  good  pur- 
poses in  practical  ways  and  at  the  places 
where  there  is  special  need  of  moral  self- 
control.  Morbid  curiosity  may  be  replaced 
by  kindly  sympathy.  To  bring  this  sub- 
stitution about,  it  is  necessary  only  to  lead 
people  to  do  unto  others  as  they  wish 
others  to  do  to  them.  In  any  case,  it  is  a 
serious  mistake  for  the  church  of  the  small 
community  to  view  this  unkindly  curiosity 
with  complacency.  If  character  is  to  be 
conserved,  a  practical  concern  must  be  felt 
for  those  experiences  that  profoundly  in- 
fluence people. 

The  church  must  certainly  guard  its  owti 
institutional  influence  from  any  reasonable 
criticism.  It  is  deeply  unfortunate  for  the 
entire  community  when  these  critical 
events   of  human   experience   are   merely 


138     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

exploited  by  the  church  for  morahzation. 
It  is  fellowship  both  in  joys  and  sorrows 
that  is  needed — not  preaching.  The  church 
is  tested  by  its  ability  to  enter  into  the 
experience  of  moral  ordeal  and  the  church 
fails  unless  it  discovers  in  such  experiences 
the  common  human  and  spiritual  meaning. 
What  we  share  with  others  in  life  we  feel; 
we  do  not  detach  ourselves  and  use  the 
results  of  our  fellowship  as  mere  homiletic 
material. 

Perhaps  in  all  one's  life  there  is  no  more 
profound  experience  than  that  which  gath- 
ers about  the  birth  of  a  child.  When  many 
people  in  the  small  community  by  keen 
spiritual  insight  feel  the  deep  significance 
of  the  coming  of  a  new  life  in  a  home,  a 
wholesome  social  atmosphere  is  certainly 
being  maintained.  The  parents  may  have 
their  own  moral  purposes  deepened  by 
being  made  conscious  in  natural,  friendly 
ways  of  this  moral  sympathy.  How  un- 
happy for  the  community  when  the  deeper 
meaning  of  the  coming  of  the  new  life  is 
lost  in  trivial,  even  morbid  curiosity!    On 


HUMAN  EXPERIENCES  139 

such  an  occasion  one  may  often  see  most 
clearly  the  real  character  of  the  spirit  of  a 
neighborhood  or  the  characteristic  moral 
culture  of  a  community. 

The  wedding  also  has  great  social  and 
moral  significance.  In  the  small  com- 
munity it  is  sure  to  attract  attention.  It 
is  an  experience  that  has  in  its  influence 
peculiar  dangers.  A  vulgar,  ostentatious 
wedding  may  for  a  long  time  bring  hito 
the  small  community  most  unhappy  in- 
fluences. An  element  of  coarseness  may, 
for  example,  be  given  emphasis  at  the 
wedding,  and  in  large  measure  the  moral 
value  of  the  experience  may  be  spoiled. 
It  is  also  true  that  a  natural,  wholesome 
wedding  with  a  moral  fellowship  at  its 
basis  may  elevate  the  purposes  of  many 
men  and  women  who  witness  it. 

And  what  may  not  be  said  concerning  the 
moral  opportunity  of  sickness  and  death? 
Perhaps  here  we  find  the  supreme  test  of 
moral  fellowship.  The  sympathy  must  be 
sincere;  its  expression  so  far  as  is  possible 
practical.    Mere  sentiment  usually  shows 


140     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

its  inner  heartlessness,  and  usually  causes 
in  him  who  suffers  an  irritation  that  has 
moral  consequences.  He  who  has  thought- 
fully observed  the  community  reaction  to 
death  knows  the  peculiar  moral  problems 
that  gather  about  it  and  about  the  funeral. 
The  experience  of  death  is  indeed  a  moral 
opportunity  for  the  church  or  the  revela- 
tion of  its  moral  inefficiency. 

Some  of  the  less  serious  experiences  have 
in  the  small  community  moral  value  for  the 
church.  The  home-coming  of  the  son  or 
daughter  and  the  community  reaction  to  it 
may  mean  much  to  the  family  concerned. 
The  struggle  with  adverse  circumstances,  a 
struggle  generally  known  throughout  the 
community,  may  give  to  those  who  pass 
through  the  ordeal  a  very  vivid  apprecia- 
tion of  the  sympathy  or  indifference  of  the 
community,  and  years  after  they  may  show 
the  influence  that  the  community  attitude 
had  upon  them. 

In  order  to  bring  wholesome  influence 
upon  those  who  are  meeting  the  morally 
significant  experiences  of  life,  the  church  of 


HUMAN  EXPERIENCES  141 

the  small  community  must  prepare  for  such 
experiences  before  they  happen.  The  effort 
to  meet  a  crisis  when  it  comes  is  often  im- 
possible, for  the  proper  basis  for  service 
has  not  been  provided.  The  right-minded 
pastor  of  the  church  of  the  small  com- 
munity will  be  always  realizing  the  sig- 
nificance of  the  experiences  that  do  make 
character  and  trj^ing  to  keep  his  church 
people  in  that  spiritual  sympathy  with  suf- 
fering that  will  enable  them  to  serve  people 
who  need  them  when  the  occasion  arises. 
The  trying  experiences  bring  to  men  and 
women  their  great  moral  dangers  and  vic- 
tories, and  the  endeavor  to  make  wise  use 
of  such  important  events  of  life  must  form 
a  part  of  the  program  of  the  church  that 
would  conserve  the  moral  wealth  of  the 
small  community. 


XIV 

THE  MINISTER  OF  THE  CHURCH 
OF  THE  SMALL  COMMUNITY 
AND  HIS  PERSONAL  OPPOR- 
TUNITIES 

The  character  and  efficiency  of  the  min- 
ister largely  decide  the  success  of  the  con- 
structive social  service  undertaken  by  the 
church  of  the  small  community.  The  min- 
ister may  be  loath  to  accept  the  burden  of 
so  great  a  responsibility  for  the  success  of 
the  program  of  the  church,  because  of  the 
handicaps  he  experiences  in  his  position. 
It  is  of  course  true  that  his  position  is 
not  an  easy  one,  but  moral  leadership  is 
never  free  from  trials  that  test  the  temper 
of  men's  souls.  So  long  as  the  minister  is 
conscious  of  moral  leadership,  he  realizes 
that  his  position  has  its  compensations.  It 
is  his  honest  doubt  of  the  value  of  his  ser- 
vice, a  scepticism  by  no  means  rare  in 
these  days,  that  furnishes  the  supreme  test 
of  his  moral  devotion. 

142 


THE  MINISTER'S  OPPORTUNITIES    143 

The  minister  who  tliinks  of  his  church  in 
causal  terms  and  who  develops  its  program 
of  social  service  with  a  sense  of  strategy 
surely  ought  to  carry  his  thinking  one  step 
farther,  and  regard  himself  and  his  oppor- 
tunities from  the  same  view-point  which  he 
has  taken  to  judge  the  work  of  the  church. 
A  serious  study  of  his  ministerial  service 
for  the  purpose  of  obtaining  efficiency 
should  greatly  increase  the  usefulness  of 
any  minister  of  a  rural  or  village  church. 
Such  a  minister  certainly  should  have  a 
very  clear  idea  of  the  resources  that  he 
personally  has  because  of  his  position. 

One  of  his  resources  is  the  opportunity 
he  has  to  conserve  his  health.  If  a  man 
has  intelligence  to  use  the  opportunities 
that  the  rural  and  village  community  pro- 
vide, he  has  the  best  possible  basis  that 
environment  can  furnish  for  the  establish- 
ment of  efficient  health.  The  man  of  the 
city  is  seldom  out  of  doors  enough;  he 
usually  does  not  exercise  in  the  open  air 
enough.  The  gymnasium  is  a  poor  sub- 
stitute for  a  long  country   walk.     As  a 


144     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

matter  of  fact,  the  minister  in  the  country 
often  fails  to  utiKze  his  opportunities  for 
physical  efficiency,  and  his  city  brother 
occasionally  by  a  greater  care  conserves 
better  his  physical  vitality.  The  country 
minister  surely  ought  to  take  seriously  his 
moral  obligation  to  keep  in  good  physical 
condition  and  to  make  use  of  the  oppor- 
tunities provided  by  his  environment. 

During  a  season  unusually  favorable  for 
winter  sports,  I  have  heard  of  only  one 
minister's  making  use  of  its  recreational 
advantages,  and  that  was  a  city  pastor  in 
charge  of  a  large  church  who  has  led 
several  Saturday  afternoon  snowshoeing 
expeditions  to  which  all  interested  persons 
were  invited.  Some  of  our  small  com- 
munities in  the  northern  part  of  our  coun- 
try need  to  take  to  heart  the  splendid  op- 
tunities  furnished  during  the  winter  for 
common  outdoor  sport  and  recreation. 
The  minister  who  appreciates  the  oppor- 
tunities for  wholesome  pleasures  and  vigor- 
making  recreation  furnished  both  winter 
and  summer  in  most  small  communities  is 


THE  MINISTER'S  OPPORTUNITIES    145 

likely  to  realize  also  the  social  value  that 
these  outdoor  activities  may  have  in  mak- 
ing people  wholesome,  healthy,  and  willing 
to  cooperate.  In  any  case  he  is  a  foolish 
man  if  he  throws  away  with  indifference 
the  means  given  him  by  his  environment 
for  the  making  of  a  life  of  physical  vitality. 
The  minister  who  works  in  the  country 
or  small  village  also  has  a  great  advantage 
over  men  in  the  city  because  of  the  close 
contact  with  nature  provided  by  the  open 
country.  This  is  one  of  the  privileges  of 
life,  although  unfortunately  it  is  one  often 
neglected  or  unrealized.  There  are  people 
who,  during  a  short  vacation  in  the  coun- 
try in  the  summer,  come  to  have  a  more 
vital  relationship  with  nature  than  many 
who  live  in  the  country  all  through  the 
year.  Certainly  this  need  not  be  true. 
The  minister  who  serves  country  people 
and  has  little  appreciation  of  the  poetry 
and  scientific  interests  represented  by  the 
rural  environment  has  lost  much  out  of 
his  life.  His  personal  loss  also  becomes  a 
loss  to  the  community,  for  rural  people 


146     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

need  always  preachers  who  can  interpret 
to  them  the  beauty  of  country  life,  so  that 
they  may  enjoy  to  its  fulness  the  wealth 
given  to  them  by  their  environment.  When 
country  life  is  robbed  of  its  beauty,  when 
the  poetry  of  the  long-stretching  fields,  of 
the  meandering  rivers,  of  the  herds  knee- 
deep  in  meadow-grass  makes  no  appeal, 
rural  existence  is  often  hard,  barren,  and 
even  brutalized.  Rural  social  health  de- 
mands that  the  intimate  relation  between 
rural  people  and  nature  should  yield  those 
romantic  and  poetic  elements  which  all 
through  human  experience  have  made  com- 
mon things  inspiring  and  profound. 

The  country  minister  may  well  cultivate 
his  ability  to  appreciate  nature.  He  is 
fortunate  if  he  is  a  lover  of  Wordsworth, 
for  no  poet  can  teach  him  more  regarding 
the  poetic  material  in  the  common  expe- 
riences of  rural  life.  Ruskin's  "Modern 
Painters"  also  may  furnish  a  key  to  the 
vast  wealth  of  beauty  contained  in  cloud, 
sky,  water,  and  even  space.  Surely  Whit- 
tier  will  not  be  forgotten  by  the  mind  that 


THE  IVnNISTERS  OPPORTUNITIES    147 

hungers  for  spiritual  insight  from  fellowship 
with  nature,  nor  will  Burns  be  neglected  by 
those  who  crave  larger  brotherhood  and 
deeper  sympathy.  The  material  for  poetic 
education  abounds  and  every  man  may 
happily  follow  his  choice.  He  who,  with  a 
sterile  imagination,  attempts  to  serve  coun- 
try people,  who  finds  all  poetry  dull,  who 
never  even  in  the  bewitching  days  of 
childhood  came  close  to  the  heart  of  na- 
ture, has  undertaken  a  great  task  with 
needful  preparation  at  one  point  at  least 
sadly  lacking. 

In  his  nearness  to  his  people  the  minister 
of  the  church  of  the  small  community  has  a 
third  advantage.  He  may  enjoy  an  inti- 
mate knowledge  of  personality,  just  as  he 
is  given  the  conditions  for  a  close  contact 
with  nature.  This  opportunity  to  know 
people  deeply  is  a  very  great  privilege  in 
ministerial  service.  Knowledge  of  men  and 
women  need  not  be  obtained  merely  from 
books.  It  is  difficult  indeed  to  live  in  the 
country  without  discovering  much  about 
human  motives,  the  weaknesses  and  the 


148     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

strength  of  character;  in  the  city,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  is  not  easy  to  uncover  the 
deeper  Hfe  of  men  and  women,  because 
they  are  hidden  in  the  crowd.  Life  moves 
on  rapidly  and  for  the  most  part  the  rela- 
tions between  persons  must  be  superficial. 
The  complaint  that  the  country  minister 
most  often  makes  is  that  his  people  are 
narrow  in  their  appreciation.  At  least  it 
has  seemed  in  conversations  with  ministers 
of  country  churches  that  this  criticism  of 
rural  people  was  most  often  made.  This 
human  fault  of  narrowness  in  one's  interests 
would  no  doubt  be  as  frequently  regretted 
by  the  urban  minister,  if  he  knew  his  con- 
gregation as  well  as  the  country  minister 
knows  his.  The  rural  minister  must  recog- 
nize the  great  advantage  of  this  close  rela- 
tionship between  him  and  his  people,  and 
he  is  short-sighted  indeed  if  he  permits  his 
intimate  and  significant  contact  to  dis- 
courage him,  because  of  the  revelation  it 
makes  of  human  weakness.  This  close 
association  of  people  and  pastor  in  the 
country  makes   it  possible  for  the  rural 


THE  MINISTER'S  OPPORTUNITIES    14d 

and  village  minister  to  realize  the  needs  of 
those  for  whom  he  works  and  to  measure 
more  accurately  the  value  of  the  service  of 
the  church.  What  the  minister  finds  in 
the  lives  of  his  people  is  both  his  test  and 
his  challenge. 

The  minister  of  the  village  or  the  coun- 
try church  has,  when  his  time  is  wisely 
conserved,  the  chance  to  study  and  think 
in  a  way  that  gives  him  substantial  intel- 
lectual results.  It  is  true  that  he  loses  in- 
spiration and  other  advantages  that  be- 
long to  the  urban  minister,  but  his 
environment  tends  to  make  his  intellectual 
experiences  penetrating.  In  the  quantita- 
tive life  of  the  city  it  is  difficult  for  the 
mind  to  get  full  value  from  its  activities. 
There  is  so  much  that  enters  the  thinking 
that  there  has  to  be  a  decrease  of  intensity. 
Many  city  thinkers  develop  a  crowded 
mind,  rather  than  one  that  is  profound. 
They  think  many  things,  but  nothing 
deeply.  The  very  limitation  imposed  upon 
the  reading  of  the  minister  of  the  church 
of  the  small  community  tends,  when  op- 


150     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

portunities  are  wisely  used,  to  develop 
solid  attainments  in  the  serious  study  of 
human  experience. 

It  is  a  happy  fact  that  the  minister  of 
the  small  community  is  becoming  so  in- 
terested in  books  that  are  concerned  with 
practical  social  problems.  The  work  of  the 
minister  is  seldom  better  than  his  thinking. 
Usually  he  thinks  in  harmony  with  the 
character  of  his  reading.  A  minister  of  a 
country  church  recently  said  that  it  was 
difficult  to  get  books  of  a  sociological  char- 
acter from  a  ministers'  lending  library  in  a 
certain  city,  although  books  of  theological 
character  could  easily  be  had.  This  was 
due  in  part  to  the  greater  number  of  theo- 
logical books  in  the  library,  but  also  to  the 
great  demand  for  books  relating  to  social 
problems.  Since  this  library  lends  books 
especially  to  country  and  village  preachers, 
this  desire  for  books  on  social  matters  is  a 
most  striking  revelation  of  the  social  view- 
point of  the  country  minister. 

This  interest  in  books  of  social  character 
certainly  promises  much  for  the  future  of 


THE  MINISTER'S  OPPORTUNITIES     151 

the  rural  church.  Men  who  Hve  in  the 
country  and  who  love  the  country  are  just 
becoming  conscious  of  their  social  require- 
ments and  resources.  The  great  need  in 
the  rural  ministry  is  men  who,  while  they 
live  deeply  in  the  every -day  life  of  the 
present,  have  social  minds  that  see  afar 
off.  It  is  to  such  leaders  that  rural  people 
turn  with  profound  craving  for  spiritual 
inspiration.  The  men  and  women  in  the 
country  who  hunger  for  social  progress  re- 
alize their  constant  need  for  spiritual  pene- 
tration. They  require  for  their  daily  duties 
the  dynamic  social  impulses  contained  in 
the  faith  of  Jesus.  Country  people  espe- 
cially, because  of  necessary  association  with 
nature,  are  morally  mutilated  by  daily  ex- 
periences that  do  not  uncover  inherent  spir- 
itual truth,  that  do  not  accomplish  moral 
discipline.  The  open  country  must  take 
possession  of  its  peculiar  character-mak- 
ing opportunities  or  grow  morally  sterile. 
The  best  of  the  country  shrivels  when  rural 
idealism  faints.  Wholesome  rural  life  re- 
quires besides  greater  production,  better 


152     COUNTRY  CHURCH  RESOURCES 

marketing,  and  more  recreation,  the  spirit 
of  moral  adventure  and  spiritual  conquest. 
The  country  minister  is  asked,  therefore, 
to  weld  together  spiritual  vision  and  social 
motive.  To  a  man  who  thinks  this  can 
seem  no  small  task.  It  demands  of  him 
social  enthusiasm  and  spiritual  vigor,  sci- 
ence and  faith.  In  his  obligation  the  rural 
minister  discovers  his  supreme  opportu- 
nity, a  part  in  the  unique  moral  crusade 
which  in  our  day  must  decide  the  charac- 
ter of  country  life  for  many  years  to  come. 


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